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WORKS,  ig  vols.,  uniform,  i6mo,  with  frontispiece,  gill 
top. 

Wake-Robin. 

Winter  Sunshine. 

Locusts  and  Wild  Honey. 

Fresh  Fields. 

Indoor  Studies. 

Birds  and  Poets,  with  Other  Papers. 

Pepacton,  and  Other  Sketches. 

Signs  and  Seasons. 

RiVERBY. 

Whitman  :  A  Study. 

The  Light  of  Day. 

Literary  Values. 

Far  and  Near. 

Ways  of  Nature. 

Leaf  and  Tendril. 

Time  and  Change. 

The  Summit  of  the  Years. 

The  Breath  of  Life. 

Under  the  Applh-Trees. 

Field  and  Study. 

FIELD  AND  STUDY,     i? iverside  Edition. 

UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES.     Riverside  Edition. 

THE  BREATH  OF   LIFE.     Riverside  Edition. 

THE  SUMMIT  OF  THE  YEARS.     Riverside  Edition. 

TIME   AND    CHANGE.     Riverside  Edition, 

LEAF   AND   TENDRIL.     Riverside  Edition. 

WAYS    OF    NATURE.     Riverside  Edition. 

FAR   AND    NEAR.     Riverside  Edition. 

L IT E R A RY  VALUES.     Riverside  Edition. 

THE    LIGHT   OF    DAY.     Riverside  Edition. 

WHITMAN:   A  Study.     Riverside  Edition. 

A  YEAR  IN  THE  FIELDS.  Selections  appropriate 
to  each  season  of  the  year,  from  the  writings  of  John 
Burroughs.  Illustrated  from  Photographs  by  Clif- 
ton Johnson. 

IN  THE  CATSKILLS.  Illustrated  from  Photographs 
by  Clifton  Johnson. 

CAMPING  AND  TRAMP.NG  WITH  ROOSEVELT. 
Illustrated  from  Photographs. 

BIRD    AND    BOUGH.     Poems. 

WINTER   SUNSHINE.     Cambridge  Classics  Series. 

WAKE- ROBIN.     Riverside  A Idine  Series. 

SQUIRRELS  AND  OTHER  FUR-BEARERS.  Illus- 
trated. 

BIRD   STORIES   FROM    BURROUGHS.     Illustrated. 

HOUGHTON  MIFFLIN  COMPANY 
Boston  and  New  York 


UNDER  THE   APPLE-TREES 


JOHN   BURROUGHS 
From  a  statuette  by  C.  S.  Pietro 


UNDER 
THE  APPLE-TREES 


BY 


JOHN  BURROUGHS 


,lic^tWMtWreftS 


BOSTON  AND  NEW  YORK 
HOUGHTON  MIFFLIN  COMPANY 


♦   . 


"COPYRIGHT,   1916,  BY  JOHN  BURROUGHS 
ALL   RIGHTS   RESERVED 

Published  May  rgrd 


FIFTH  IMPRESSION,  APRIL,  I922 


r 


^-^"^ 


^^S^  W-^i*-©"^^" 


PREFACE 


I  AM  quite  certain  that  the  majority  of  my  read- 
ers would  have  me  always  stick  to  natural  his- 
tory themes.  I  sympathize  with  them.  I  am  myself 
never  so  well  pleased  as  when  I  can  bring  them  a 
fresh  bit  of  natural  history,  or  give  them  a  day  with 
me  in  the  fields  and  woods  or  along  the  murmuring 
streams.  Birds  and  squirrels  come  home  to  us  all 
in  a  way  that  speculative  ideas  do  not.  While  writ- 
ing my  more  philosophical  dissertations,  my  mind 
often  turns  longingly  toward  the  simple  outdoor 
subjects  which  have  engaged  me  so  many  years,  and 
doubtless  the  mind  of  my  reader  does  also  when  he 
is  perusing  them.  But  one  cannot  always  choose  at 
such  times.  Natural  history  is  a  matter  of  obser- 
vation; it  is  a  harvest  which  you  gather  when  and 
where  you  find  it  growing.  Birds  and  squirrels  and 
flowers  are  not  always  in  season,  but  philosophy  we 
have  always  with  us.  It  is  a  crop  which  we  can 
grow  and  reap  at  all  times  and  in  all  places,  and  it 
has  its  own  value  and  brings  its  own  satisfaction. 

We  are  all  philosophers,  we  all  delight  in  finding 
the  reason  of  things  and  in  tracing  the  relation  of 
things,  and  to  know,  for  instance,  what  part  chance 
plays  in  our  lives,  and  what  part  is  played  by  rigid 
law,  is  a  worthy  and  engaging  problem.    I  do  not 

V 

1269? 


PREFACE 

flatter  myself  that  I  can  resolve  it,  or  any  other 
similar  question,  but  I  find  the  effort  stimulating, 
and  now  and  then  I  get  a  gleam  of  light. 

We  live  in  a  wonderful  world,  and  the  wonders  of 
the  world  without  us  are  matched  and  more  than 
matched  by  the  wonders  of  the  world  within  us. 
This  interior  world  has  its  natural  history  also,  and 
to  observe  and  record  any  of  its  facts  and  incidents, 
or  trace  any  of  its  natural  processes,  is  well  worthy 
of  our  best  moments. 

I  have  given  the  name  of  the  initial  chapter, 
"Under  the  Apple-Trees,"  to  the  whole  collection, 
because  most  of  the  essays  were  written  in  my  camp 
under  the  trees,  in  the  old  orchard  where  I  gathered 
apples  as  a  farm-boy.  The  wild  life  about  me  ap- 
pealed to  my  love  of  natural  history,  while  thoughts 
and  suggestions  from  beyond  the  horizon  occupied 
my  more  philosophical  meditations. 

John  Burroughs. 


CONTENTS 

*'  I.  Under  the  Apple-Trees   .      .      .      .      ,      1 

t  II.  The  Friendly  Rocks 40 

ni.  The  Master  Instinct 65 

IV.  Dame  Nature  and  her  Children       .      .    82 
>  V.  Old  Friends  in  New  Places  .      «      .      .    90 

VI.  The  Still  Small  Voice 105 

VII.  Nature  Leaves 112 

I.    IN   WARBLER   TIME 112 

II.    A   SHORT   WALK 116 

III.  IN   SOUTHERN   CALIFORNIA  .  .  ,  ,  .117 

IV.  ARE   THERE   COUNTERFEITS  IN  NATURE?  .  .121 

VIII.  The  Primal  Mind 125 

IX.  "Fated  to  be  Free" 142 

X.  Scientific  Faith  Once  More        .      .      .159 

XI.  Literature  and  Science 176 

XII.  "A  Prophet  of  the  Soul"     ....  197 

XIII.  Life  and  Chance 228 

XIV.  Life  the  Traveler 262 

vu 


CONTENTS 

XV.  Great  Questions  in  Littu:    .      .      ,      »  289 

I.    THE   ETHER     ........  289 

n.    NATURAL  SELECTION 291 

III.  SPECULATION   AND    EXPERIMENT  .  .  .  293 

IV.  EARLY   MAN 295 

V.   ASTRONOMIC   GRANDEUR 297 

VI.    WHY   AND   HOW       ....  -  .  300 

VII.    LIMITATIONS   OF   SCIENCE 301 

VIII.    BEGINNINGS 303 

EX.   EVOLUTION .  306 

X.   AN  UNKNOWN   FACTOR  .....  308 

Index    ...      o      .....      .  309 


UNDER  THE   APPLE-TREES 


I 

UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 
Part  I 

THERE  are  few  places  on  the  farm  where  there 
is  so  much  live  natural  history  to  be  gathered  as 
in  the  orchard.  All  the  wild  creatures  seem  to  feel 
the  friendly  and  congenial  atmosphere  of  the  or- 
chard. The  trees  bear  a  crop  of  birds,  if  not  of 
apples,  every  season.  Few  are  the  winged  visitors 
from  distant  climes  that  do  not,  sooner  or  later, 
tarry  a  bit  in  the  orchard.  Many  birds,  such  as  the 
robin,  the  chippy,  the  hummingbird,  the  cedar-bird, 
the  goldfinch,  and  some  of  the  flycatchers,  nest 
there.  The  great  crested  flycatcher  loves  the  old 
hollow  limbs,  and  the  little  red  owl  often  lives  in  a 
cavity  in  the  trunk.  The  jays  visit  the  orchard  on 
their  piratical  excursions  in  quest  of  birds'  eggs,  and 
now  and  then  they  discover  the  owl  in  his  retreat 
and  set  up  a  great  hue  and  cry  over  their  discovery. 
On  such  occasions  they  will  take  turns  in  looking 
into  the  dim  cavity  and  crying,  "Thief,  thief!" 
most  vociferously,  the  culprit  meanwhile,  appar- 
ently, sitting  wrapped  in  utter  oblivion. 

In  May  and  June  the  cuckoo  comes  to  the  orchard 
for  tent  caterpillars,  and  the  woodpeckers  come  at 

1 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

all  seasons  —  the  downy  and  the  hair>^  to  the  good 
of  the  trees,  the  yellow-bellied  often  to  their  injury. 
The  two  former  search  for  the  eggs  and  the  larvae 
of  the  insects  that  infest  the  trees,  as  do  the  nut- 
hatches and  the  chickadees,  which  come  quite  as 
regularly;  but  the  yellow-bellied  comes  for  the  life- 
blood  of  the  trees  themselves.  He  is  popularly 
known  as  the  "sapsucker,"  and  a  sapsucker  he  is. 
Many  apple-trees  in  everj"  orchard  are  pock-marked 
by  his  bill,  and  occasionally  a  branch  is  evidently 
killed  by  his  many  and  broad  drillings.  As  I  write 
these  lines,  on  September  the  26th,  in  my  bush 
tent  in  one  of  the  home  orchards,  a  sapsucker  is 
busy  on  a  veteran  apple-tree  whose  fruit  has  often 
gone  to  school  with  me  in  my  pockets  during  my 
boyhood  days  on  the  farm.  He  goes  about  his  work 
systematically,  \'isiting  now  one  of  the  large  branches 
and  then  a  portion  of  the  tnmk,  and  drilling  his 
holes  in  rows  about  a  quarter  of  an  inch  apart. 
Every  square  foot  of  the  trunk  contains  from  three 
hundred  to  four  hundred  holes,  new  and  old,  cut 
through  into  the  inner,  vital  cambium  layer.  The 
holes  are  about  the  size  of  the  end  of  a  ly^e-straw, 
and  run  in  rings  around  the  tree,  the  rings  being 
about  a  half  an  inch  apart.  The  newly  cut  ones 
quickly  fill  with  sap,  which,  to  my  tongue,  has  a 
rather  insipid  taste,  but  which  is  evidently  relished 
by  the  woodp>ecker.  He  drills  two  or  three  holes, 
then  pauses  a  moment,  and  when  they  are  filled 

2 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

sips  his  apple-tree  tipple  leisurely.  The  drain  upon 
the  vitality  of  the  tree  at  any  one  time,  by  this  tap- 
ping, cannot  be  very  serious,  but  in  the  course  of 
years  must  certainly  affect  its  vigor  considerably. 
I  have  seen  it  stated  in  print,  by  a  writer  who  evi- 
dently draws  upon  his  fancy  for  his  facts,  that  in 
making  these  holes  the  bird  is  settmg  a  trap  for  in- 
sects, and  that  these  are  what  it  feeds  upon.  But  the 
bird  is  a  sapsucker;  there  are  no  insects  at  his  wells 
to-day;  he  visits  them  very  regularly,  and  is  con- 
stantly drilling  new  ones. 

His  mate,  or  at  least  a  female,  comes,  and  I  over- 
hear the  two  in  soft,  gentle  conversation.  "\Mien 
I  appear  upon  the  scene,  the  female  scurries  away 
in  alarm,  calling  as  she  retreats,  as  if  for  the  male  to 
follow;  but  he  does  not.  He  eyes  me  for  a  moment, 
and  then  sidles  round  behind  the  trunk  of  the  tree, 
and  as  I  go  back  to  my  table  I  hear  his  hammer 
again.  YeTV  soon  the  female  is  back  and  I  hear  their 
conversation  cjoing;  on  as  before.  Dav  after  dav  the 
male  is  here  tapping  the  trees.  His  blows  are  soft 
and  can  be  heard  onlv  a  few  vards  awav.  He  evi- 
dently  has  his  favorites.  In  this  orchard  of  twenty 
or  more  trees,  only  two  are  worked  now,  and  only 
three  have  ever  been  worked  much.  The  two  favor- 
ites bear  hard,  sour  fruit.  The  bark  of  a  sweet  apple- 
tree  does  not  show  a  single  hole.  A  grafted  tree 
shows  no  holes  on  the  original  stock,  but  many 
punctures  on  the  graft.  One  day  I  saw  the  bird 

3 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

frequently  leave  his  drilling  on  one  tree  and  go  to 
another,  drilling  into  a  small  red  apple  which  had 
lodged  among  some  twigs  on  a  horizontal  branch;  he 
ate  the  pulp,  and  had  made  quite  a  large  hole  in 
the  apple,  when  it  became  dislodged  and  fell  to  the 
ground.  It  is  plain,  therefore,  that  the  sapsucker 
likes  the  juice  of  the  apple,  and  of  the  tree  that  bears 
the  apple.  He  is  the  only  orchard  bird  who  is  a 
tippler.  Among  the  forest  trees,  he  sucks  the  sap  of 
the  sugar  maples  in  spring,  and  I  have  seen  evi- 
dence of  his  having  drilled  into  small  white  pines, 
cutting  out  an  oblong  section  from  the  bark,  appar- 
ently to  get  at  the  soft  cambium  layer. 

It  is  a  pleasant  experience  to  sit  in  my  orchard 
camp  of  a  still  morning  and  hear  an  apple  drop  here 
and  there  —  "  indolent  ripe,"  as  Whitman  says,  in  the 
fullness  of  time,  or  prematurely  ripe  from  a  worm 
at  its  heart.  The  worm  finds  its  account  in  getting 
down  to  the  ground  where  it  can  pupate,  and  in  both 
cases  the  tree  has  finished  a  bit  of  its  work  and  is 
getting  ready  for  its  winter  sleep ;  and  in  both  cases 
the  squirrels  and  the  woodchucks  profit  by  the  fall. 
But  September  woodchucks  are  few;  most  of  them 
retire  to  their  holes  for  the  long  winter  sleep  during 
this  month;  the  harvest  apples  that  fall  in  August 
hit  them  at  the  right  moment;  but  the  red  squirrels 
are  alert  for  the  apple-seeds  during  both  months, 
and  they  chip  up  many  apples  for  these  delicate 
morsels.   They  also  love  the  hollow  branches  and 

4 


\- 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

trunks  of  the  trees,   in  which  they  make  their 
homes. 

Little  currents  of  wild  life  hourly  flow  about  me. 
Yesterday,  amid  the  slow  rain  and  mist  and  general 
obscurity,  there  was  suddenly  an  influx  of  birds  in 
all  the  old  apple-trees  about  me.  Robins  appeared  by 
twos  and  threes  in  some  choke-cherry  bushes  a  few 
yards  below  me,  and  with  much  cackling  and  flutter- 
ing helped  themselves  to  the  fruit.  A  hermit  thrush 
perched  on  a  dry  limb  in  front  of  my  tent  and  in 
many  different  postures  surveyed  me  in  my  canvas 
cavern,  uttering  a  low  note  which  I  took  to  be  his 
comments  upon  me.  You  may  always  know  the 
hermit  thrush  from  the  other  thrushes  by  that 
peculiar,  soft,  breathing  motion  of  its  tail.  A  male 
redstart  came  and  flitted  and  flashed  about  the 
apple-branches  without  heeding  me  at  all.  Whitman 
asks :  — 

"  Do  you  take  it  I  would  astonish? 
Does  the  dayUght  astonish?  does  the  early  redstart 

twittering  through  the  woods? 
Do  I  astonish  more  than  they?  " 

The  redstart,  with  his  black-and-orange  suit,  and 
his  quick,  lively  motions,  does  not  astonish,  but  few 
birds  give  the  eye  more  pleasure.  How  gay  and 
festive  he  looks,  darting  and  flashing  amid  the 
gnarled  and  scaly  branches  of  the  decaying  apple- 
trees!  It  seems  as  if  aU  his  motions  were  designed 
to  show  off  his  plumage  to  the  best  advantage. 

5 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

With  tail  slightly  raised  and  spread,  and  wings  a 
little  drooping,  he  springs  and  swoops  here  and 
there  in  the  trees  —  a  bit  of  black  holding  and 
momentarily  revealing  a  flame  of  orange.  Redstart 
is  a  good  name  for  him,  as  we  see  his  colors  only 
when  he  is  in  motion.  Note  our  other  black-and- 
orange  bird,  the  Baltimore  oriole;  its  color  is  con- 
spicuous while  the  bird  is  at  rest.  Another  bril- 
liantly colored  bird,  the  scarlet  tanager,  is  seen 
from  afar  when  quietly  perched.  He  shows  amid 
the  green  leaves  like  a  burning  coal;  and  his  mo- 
tions are  all  slow  and  deliberate  when  contrasted  with 
those  of  the  redstart.  The  latter  is  a  fly-catcher, 
or  insect-catcher,  and  his  movements  are  neces- 
sarily sudden  and  rapid. 

The  birds  are  quite  likely  to  go  in  troops  in  late 
summer  or  early  fall,  different  species  apparently 
being  drawn  along  by  a  common  impulse. 

While  the  robins  and  the  hermit  thrush  are  among 
the  choke-cherries,  a  family  of  indigo-birds,  five  or 
six  of  them,  all  of  the  brown  color  of  the  mother 
bird,  are  grouped  around  the  mother  on  a  flat  stone 
for  half  a  minute,  being  fed.  It  is  a  pretty  little 
tableau.  The  father  bird  with  his  bright  plumage 
is  not  in  evidence.  In  one  of  the  trees  another 
warbler  which  I  cannot  identify,  with  an  olive 
back  and  a  yellow  front,  is  in  a  great  hurry  about 
its  own  business.  One  little  olive-green  warbler, 
doubtless  a  young  bird,  comes  and  perches  on  the 

6 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

edge  of  my  table,  and,  quite  oblivious  of  my  pres- 
ence, looks  my  papers  and  books  over  for  the  insect 
tidbit  which  he  does  not  find.  How  round  and  bril- 
liant and  eager  are  his  eyes!  If  he  is  looking  for  a 
bookworm,  he  fails  to  find  it. 

A  phoebe-bird  perches  here  and  there  and  makes 
sudden  swoops  to  the  ground  for  the  insects  which 
she  cannot  find  on  the  wing.  Phoebe  hunts  by 
sight  at  long  range.  Her  eye  seems  telescopic, 
rather  than  microscopic  like  the  warbler's.  She  ex- 
plores the  air  and  the  ground  and  sees  her  game 
from  afar.  At  all  hours  of  the  day  she  perches  on 
the  broTsm  dead  branches  of  the  apple-trees,  and 
waits  for  her  prey  to  appear,  her  straight,  stiff  tail 
hingeing  up  and  down  at  her  rump. 

At  present  my  favorite  denizen  of  the  orchard  is 
the  chipmunk.  He,  too,  likes  the  apple-seeds,  but 
he  is  not  given  to  chipping  up  the  apples  as  much  as 
is  the  red  squirrel.  He  waits  till  the  apples  are  ripe 
and  then  nibbles  the  pulp.  He  also  likes  the  orchard 
because  it  veils  his  movements;  when  making  his 
trips  to  and  fro,  if  danger  threatens,  the  trunk  of 
every  tree  is  a  house  of  refuge. 

As  I  write  these  lines  in  my  leafy  tent,  a  chipmunk 
comes  in,  foraging  for  his  winter  supplies.  I  have 
brought  him  cherry-pits  and  peach-pits  and  cracked 
wheat,  from  time  to  time,  and  now  he  calls  on  me 
several  times  a  day.  His  den  is  in  the  orchard  but  a 
few  yards  from  me,  and  I  enjoy  having  him  for  so 

7 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

near  a  neighbor.  He  has  at  last  become  so  familiar 
that  he  climbs  to  my  lap,  then  to  the  table,  then  to 
my  shoulder  and  head,  looking  for  the  kernels  of 
popcorn  that  he  is  convinced  have  some  perennial 
source  of  supply  near  me  or  about  me.  He  clears  up 
every  kernel,  and  then  on  his  return,  in  a  few  min- 
utes, there  they  are  again !  I  might  think  him  a  good 
deal  puzzled  by  the  prompt  renewal  of  the  supply 
if  I  were  to  read  my  own  thoughts  into  his  little  nod- 
dle, but  I  see  he  is  only  eager  to  gather  his  harvest 
while  it  is  plentiful  and  so  near  at  hand.  No,  he  is 
not  influenced  even  by  that  consideration;  he  does 
not  consider  at  all,  in  fact,  but  just  goes  for  the  corn 
in  nervous  eagerness  and  haste.  Yet,  if  he  does  not 
reflect,  he  certainly  has  a  wisdom  and  foresight  of 
his  own.  This  morning  I  mixed  kernels  of  fresh-cut 
green  corn  with  a  handful  of  the  dry,  hard  popcorn 
upon  the  floor.  At  first  he  began  to  eat  the  soft 
sweet  corn,  but,  finding  the  small,  dry  kernels  of  the 
popcorn,  he  at  once  began  to  stuff  his  cheek  pockets 
with  them,  and  when  they  were  full  he  hastened  off 
to  his  den.  Back  he  came  in  about  three  minutes 
and  he  kept  on  doing  this  till  the  popcorn  was  all 
gone;  then  he  proceeded  to  make  his  breakfast  off 
the  green  corn.  When  this  was  exhausted,  he  began 
to  strip  some  choke-cherries  (which  I  had  also  placed 
among  the  corn)  of  their  skins  and  pulp,  and  to  fill 
his  pockets  with  the  pits,  thus  carrying  no  perish- 
able food  to  his  den.  He  acted  exactly  as  if  he  knew 

8 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

that  the  green  corn  and  the  choke-cherries  would 
spoil  in  his  underground  retreat,  and  that  the  hard, 
dry  kind,  and  the  cherry-pits,  would  keep.  He  did 
know  it,  but  not  as  you  and  I  know  it,  by  experi- 
ence; he  knew  it,  as  all  the  wild  creatures  know  how 
to  get  on  in  the  world,  by  the  wisdom  that  pervades 
nature,  and  is  much  older  than  we  or  they  are. 

My  chipmunk  knows  corn,  cherry-pits,  buck- 
wheat, beech-nuts,  apple-seeds,  and  probably  several 
other  foods,  at  sight;  but  peach-pits,  hickory -nuts^ 
dried  sweet  corn,  he  at  first  passed  by,  and  pea- 
nuts I  could  not  tempt  him  to  touch  at  all.  He  was 
at  first  indifferent  to  the  rice,  but,  on  nibbling  at  it 
and  finding  it  toothsome,  he  began  to  fill  his  pockets 
with  it.  Amid  the  rice  I  scattered  puffed  wheat. 
This  he  repeatedly  took  up  and  chipped  into,  at- 
tracted probably  by  the  odor,  but,  finding  it  hollow, 
or  at  least  very  spongy  and  unsubstantial  in  its  in- 
terior, he  quickly  dropped  it.  It  was  not  solid 
enough  to  get  into  his  winter  stores.  After  I  had 
cracked  a  few  hickory-nuts  he  became  very  eager 
for  them,  and  it  was  amusing  to  see  him,  as  he  sat  on 
my  table,  struggle  to  force  the  larger  ones  into  his 
pockets,  supplementing  the  contractile  power  of  his 
cheek  muscles  with  his  paws.  \Mien  he  failed  to 
pocket  one,  he  would  take  it  in  his  teeth  and  make 
off.  I  offered  him  some  peach-pits  also,  but  he  only 
carried  one  of  them  up  on  the  stone  wall  and  han- 
dled it  awhile,  then  looked  it  over  and  left  it.   But 

9 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

after  I  had  cracked  a  few  of  them  and  had  thus  given 
him  a  taste  of  what  was  in  them,  he  began  to  carry 
them  to  his  den. 

It  is  interesting  to  see  how  well  these  wild  crea- 
tures are  groomed  —  every  hair  in  its  place  and 
shining  as  if  it  had  just  been  polished.  The  tail  of 
my  chipmunk  is  simply  perfect  —  not  a  hair  missing 
or  soiled  or  worn.  In  fact,  the  whole  animal  looks  as 
new  and  fresh  as  a  coin  just  minted,  or  a  flower  just 
opened.  His  underground  habits  leave  no  mark  or 
stain  upon  him,  and  his  daily  labors  do  not  rujffle  a 
hair.  This  is  true  of  nearly  all  the  wild  creatures. 
Domestication  changes  all  this;  domestic  animals 
become  dirty  and  unkempt.  The  half -tame  gray 
squirrels  in  the  parks  have  little  of  the  wild  grace  and 
beauty  of  the  squirrels  in  the  woods.  Especially  do 
their  tails  deteriorate,  and  their  sylvan  airiness  and 
delicacy  disappear. 

The  whole  character  of  the  squirrel  culminates 
and  finds  expression  in  its  tail  —  all  its  nervous  rest- 
lessness and  wild  beauty,  all  its  jauntiness,  archness, 
and  suspicion,  and  every  change  of  emotion,  seem 
to  ripple  out  along  this  appendage. 

How  furtive  and  nervous  my  chipmunk  is,  rush- 
ing about  by  little  jerks  incessantly,  not  stopping 
for  anything!  His  bright,  unwinking  eyes,  his  pal- 
pitating body,  his  sudden  spasmodic  movements, 
his  eagerness,  his  industry,  his  sleekness  and  clean- 
liness —  what  a  picture  he  makes !   Apparently  he 

10 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

does  not  know  me  from  a  stump  or  a  clothes-horse. 
His  cold  paws  on  my  warm  hand,  on  my  arm,  or  on 
my  head  give  him  no  hint  of  danger;  no  odors 
from  my  body,  or  look  from  my  eyes,  disturb  him; 
the  sound  of  my  voice  does  not  alarm  him ;  but  any 
movement  on  my  part,  and  he  is  off.  It  is  moving 
things  —  cats,  weasels,  hawks,  foxes  —  that  mean 
danger  to  him.  In  the  little  circuit  of  his  life  — 
gathering  his  winter  stores  and  his  daily  subsistence, 
spinning  along  the  fences,  threading  the  woods  and 
bushes,  his  eye  and  his  ear  are  evidently  his  main 
dependence ;  odors  and  still  objects  concern  him  lit- 
tle, but  moving  things  very  much.  I  once  saw  a 
chipmunk  rush  to  his  den  in  the  side  of  a  bank  with 
great  precipitation,  and  in  a  moment,  like  a  flash,  a 
shrike  darted  down  and  hovered  over  the  entrance. 
I  can  talk  to  my  chipmunk  in  low,  slow  tones  and 
he  heeds  me  not,  but  any  unusual  sound  outside  the 
camp,  and  he  is  alertness  itself.  One  day  when  he 
was  on  my  table  a  crow  flew  over  and  called  sharply 
and  loudly;  the  squirrel  sat  up  and  took  notice  in- 
stantly; with  his  paws  upon  his  breast  he  listened 
and  looked  intently  for  a  few  seconds,  and  then  re- 
sumed his  foraging.  At  another  time  the  sharp  call 
of  a  red  squirrel  in  a  tree  near  by  made  him  still  more 
nervous.  With  one  raised  paw  he  looked  and  lis- 
tened for  two  or  three  minutes.  The  red  squirrel 
hazes  him  on  all  occasions,  and,  I  think,  often  robs 
him  of  his  stores. 

11 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

No  doubt  the  chipmunk  has  many  narrow  es- 
capes from  hawks.  A  hunter  told  me  recently  of  a 
hawk-and-chipmunk  incident  that  he  had  witnessed 
the  day  before  in  the  woods  on  the  mountain.  He 
was  standing  still  listening  to  the  baying  of  his 
hound  on  the  trail  of  a  fox.  Suddenly  there  was  a 
rush  and  clatter  of  wings  in  the  maple-trees  near 
him,  and  he  saw  a  large  hawk  m  pursuit  of  a  chip- 
munk coming  down,  close  to  the  trunk  of  a  tree,  like 
a  thimderbolt.  As  the  hawk  struck  the  ground,  the 
hunter  shot  him  dead.  He  had  the  squirrel  in  his 
claw  as  in  a  trap,  and  the  hunter  had  to  pry  the 
talon  open  to  free  the  victim,  which  was  alive  and 
able  to  run  away.  From  the  description  I  guessed 
the  hawk  to  be  a  goshawk.  What  the  chipmunk  vv^as 
doing  up  that  tree  is  a  mystery  to  me,  since  he  sel- 
dom ventures  far  from  the  ground;  but  the  truth  of 
the  incident  is  unquestioned. 

When  the  chipmunk  is  in  the  open,  the  sense  of 
danger  is  never  absent  from  him.  He  is  always  on 
the  alert.  In  his  excursions  along  the  fences  to  col- 
lect wild  buckwheat,  wild  cherries,  and  various 
grains,  he  is  watchfulness  itself.  In  every  trip  to  his 
den  with  his  supplies,  his  manner  is  like  that  of  the 
baseball-player  in  running  the  bases  —  he  makes  a 
dash  from  my  study,  leaping  high  over  the  grass  and 
weeds,  to  an  apple-tree  ten  yards  away;  here  he 
pauses  a  few  seconds  and  nervously  surveys  his 
course  ahead;  then  he  makes  another  sprint  to  a 

12 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

second  apple-tree,  and  pauses  as  before,  quickly 
glancing  round;  then  in  a  few  leaps  he  is  at  home, 
and  in  his  den.    Returning,  he  usually  pursues  the 
same  course.   He  leaves  no  trail,  and  is  never  off  his 
guard.   No  baseball  runner  was  ever  more  watchful. 
Apparently  while  in  the  open  he  does  not  draw  one 
breath  free  from  a  keen  sense  of  danger.    I  have 
tempted  him  to  search  my  coat  pockets  for  the  nuts 
or  cherry-pits  that  I  have  placed  there,  and,  when  he 
does  so,  he  seems  to  appreciate  at  what  a  disadvan- 
tage his  enemy  might  find  him  —  his  eyes  are  for 
the  moment  covered,  his  rear  is  exposed,  his  whole 
situation  is  very  insecure;  hence  he  seizes  a  nut  and 
reverses  his  position  in  a  twinkling;  his  body  palpi- 
tates; his  eyes  bulge;  then  he  dives  in  again  and 
seizes  another  nut  as  before,  acting  as  if  he  thought 
each  moment  might  be  his  last.   When  he  goes  into 
the  tin  cocoa-box  for  the  cherry -pits,  he  does  it  with 
the  hurry  of  fear;  his  eyes  are  above  the  rim  every 
second  or  two;  he  does  not  stop  to  clean  the  pits  as 
he  does  when  on  my  table,  but  scoops  them  up  with 
the  greatest  precipitation,  as  if  he  feared  I  might 
clap  on  the  lid  at  any  moment  and  make  him  pris- 
oner.  In  all  the  hundred  and  one  trips  he  has  made 
from  my  camp  to  his  den  he  has  not  for  one  moment 
forgotten  himself;  he  runs  all  the  bases  with  the  same 
alertness  and  precaution.  Coming  back,  he  emerges 
from  his  hole,  sits  up,  washes  his  face,  then  looks 
swiftly  about,  and  is  off  for  the  base  of  supplies. 

13 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

One  day  I  went  by  a  roundabout  course  and  stood 
three  paces  from  his  hole.  In  the  mean  time  he  had 
loaded  up,  and  he  came  running  over  the  course  in 
his  usual  style,  but  before  he  left  the  second  base  he 
saw  me,  or  an  apparition  that  was  not  there  before, 
and  became  very  nervous.  He  jumped  about;  he  sat 
up  on  his  haunches  and  looked;  crouched  by  a  wood- 
chuck's  hole  and  eyed  me,  his  cheeks  protruding; 
changed  his  attitude  a  dozen  times;  then,  as  the 
apparition  changed  not,  he  started  and  came  one 
third  of  the  way;  then  his  heart  failed  him  and  he 
rushed  back.  More  posing  and  scrutinizing,  when 
he  made  a  second  dash  that  brought  him  two  thirds 
of  the  way;  then  his  fears  overcame  him  again,  and 
he  again  rushed  to  cover.  Repeating  his  former  be- 
havior for  a  few  moments,  he  made  a  third  dash  and 
reached  the  home  base  in  safety.  How  carefully  he 
seems  to  carry  his  tail  on  entering  his  hole,  so  as  not 
to  let  it  touch  the  sides!  He  is  out  again  in  less 
than  a  minute,  and,  erect  upon  his  haunches,  looks 
me  squarely  in  the  eye.  He  is  greatly  agitated;  he 
has  not  had  that  experience  before.  What  does  it 
mean?  Erect  on  his  hind  legs,  he  stands  almost 
motionless  and  eyes  me.  I  stand  motionless,  too, 
with  a  half -eaten  apple  in  my  hand.  I  wink  and 
breathe;  so  does  he.  For  ten  minutes  we  confront 
each  other  in  this  fashion,  then  he  turns  his  back 
upon  me  and  drops  down.  He  looks  toward  the 
camp;  he  remembers  the  nuts  and  corn  awaiting 

14 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

him  there;  he  stirs  uneasily;  he  changes  his  position; 
he  looks  at  my  motionless  figure  again,  then  toward 
the  source  of  supplies,  and  is  off,  leaving  me  at  his 
threshold.  In  two  minutes  he  is  back  again  with 
protruding  pockets,  and  now  makes  the  home  run 
without  a  pause.  He  emerges  again  from  his  den, 
washes  his  face  three  times,  his  mouth  first,  then  his 
nose  and  cheeks,  then  is  off  for  another  load.  I  re- 
turn to  my  chair  and  soon  he  is  again  on  my  lap  and 
table,  or  sitting  in  the  hollow  of  my  hand,  loading  up 
as  before.  The  apparition  in  the  chair  has  no  terrors 
for  him. 

I  would  not  say  that  he  is  burdened  with  a  con- 
scious sense  of  danger;  rather  is  his  fear  instinctive 
and  unconscious.  It  is  in  his  blood  —  born  with 
him  and  a  part  of  his  life.  His  race  has  been  the 
prey  of  various  animals  and  birds  for  untold  ages, 
and  it  has  survived  by  reason  of  an  instinctive  w^atch- 
fulness  that  has  been  pushed  to  the  highest  degree 
of  development.  He  is  on  the  lookout  for  danger  as 
constantly  as  he  is  on  the  lookout  for  food,  and  he 
takes  no  more  thought  about  the  one  than  about  the 
other.  His  life  is  keyed  to  the  fear  pitch  all  the  time. 
His  heart  beats  as  fast  as  the  ticking  of  a  watch,  and 
all  his  movements  are  as  abrupt  and  spasmodic  as 
if  they  were  born  of  alarm.  His  behavior  is  an  excel- 
lent illustration  of  the  unconscious  fear  that  per- 
vades a  large  part  of  the  animal  kingdom. 

All  creatures  that  are  preyed  upon  by  others  lead 

15 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

this  life  of  fear.  I  don't  know  that  the  crow  is  ever 
preyed  upon  by  any  other  creature,  so  he  apparently 
has  a  pretty  good  time.  He  is  social  and  noisy  and 
in  the  picnicking  mood  all  the  day  long.  Hawks 
apparently  are  afraid  of  man  only.  Hence  their  lives 
must  be  comparatively  free  from  harassing  fear. 
Even  fish  in  the  streams  are  not  exempt  from  fear. 
They  are  preyed  upon  by  large  fish,  and  by  minks 
and  otters,  and  by  the  fish  hawk.  If  the  weasel  has  a 
natural  enemy,  I  don't  know  what  it  is.  He  is  the 
boldest  of  the  bold.  He  might  be  captured  by  a 
hawk  or  an  eagle,  but  such  occurrences  are  probably 
very  rare,  as  a  weasel  can  dodge  almost  anything 
but  a  gun. 

Of  all  our  wild  creatures  the  rabbit  has  the  most 
enemies;  weasels,  minks,  foxes,  wildcats,  and  owls 
are  hovering  about  poor  Bunnie  at  all  times.  No 
wonder  she  never  closes  her  eyes,  even  in  sleep. 
To  compensate  in  a  measure  for  all  this,  nature  has 
made  her  very  fleet  of  foot  and  very  prolific,  so  that 
the  race  of  rabbits  is  in  full  tide,  notwithstanding 
its  many  enemies. 

Such  animals  as  the  skunk  and  the  porcupine  show 
little  fear,  because  their  natural  enemies,  if  they 
have  any,  would  go  by  on  the  other  side.  There  is 
evidence  that  the  skunk  is  sometimes  preyed  upon 
by  the  fox  and  the  eagle  and  the  horned  owl,  and  the 
porcupine  by  the  lynx  and  the  wolf,  but  these  must 
be  exceptional  occurrences.  The  lion  probably  fears 

16 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

nothing  but  man.  Little  wonder  that  he  looks  calm 
and  majestic  and  always  at  his  ease !  But  I  am  get- 
ting away  from  my  apple-trees. 

The  arch-enemy  of  the  chipmunk  is  the  small  red 
weasel,  and  I  wonder  if  it  is  to  hide  from  him  that  he 
usually  digs  his  den  away  from  the  fences  and  other 
cover,  in  clean  open  ground,  leaving  no  clue  what- 
ever as  to  its  whereabouts.  He  carries  away  all  the 
soil,  and  either  makes  a  pile  of  it  some  feet  away, 
or  else  hides  it  completely.  The  den  of  my  little 
neighbor  is  in  the  open  grassy  space  between  the 
rows  of  apple-trees,  thirty  or  more  yards  from  either 
fence.  All  that  is  visible  of  it  is  a  small  round  hole 
in  the  ground  nearly  concealed  by  the  overhanging 
grass.   I  had  to  watch  him  in  order  to  find  it. 

His  chamber  is  about  three  feet  below  the  surface 
of  the  ground,  and  has  but  one  entrance,  through  a 
long  crooked  passage  eight  or  ten  feet  long.  If  his 
arch-enemy  were  to  find  it,  there  would  be  no  es- 
cape. There  is  no  back  door,  and  there  are  no  secret 
passages.  Probably  many  a  tragedy  is  enacted  in 
those  little  earth-chambers.  The  weasel  himself 
fears  nothing;  he  is  the  incarnation  of  bloodthirsti- 
ness,  and  his  victims  seem  so  horrified  at  the  dis- 
covery that  he  is  pursuing  them  that  they  become 
paralyzed.  Even  the  fleet-footed  rabbit  in  the  open 
woods  or  fields  falls  an  easy  prey. 

One  day  last  summer  as  I  sat  at  the  table  in  my 
hay-barn  study,  tlicre  boldly  entered  through  th£ 

17 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

open  door  this  arch-enemy  of  our  small  rodents  — 
brown  of  back  and  white  of  belly.  He  rushed  in  as  if 
on  very  hurrying  business,  and  all  my  efforts  to  de- 
tain him,  by  squeaking  like  a  mouse,  and  chirping 
like  a  bird,  proved  unavailing.  He  thrust  out  his 
impudent  snake-Uke  head  and  neck  from  an  opening 
in  the  wall,  and  fixed  his  intense,  beady  eyes  upon 
me  for  a  moment,  and  was  gone.  I  feared  he  was  on 
the  trail  of  the  chipmunk  that  had  just  carried  away 
the  cherry-pits  I  had  placed  for  him  on  a  stone  near 
by;  but  the  little  rodent  appeared  a  half -hour  later, 
as  sleek  as  ever,  but  with  a  touch  of  something  sus- 
picious and  anxious  in  his  manner,  as  if  he  had  at 
least  had  tidings  that  his  deadly  enemy  was  in  the 
neighborhood. 

After  I  had  cracked  some  hickory-nuts  for  my 
little  friend  this  morning,  and  he  had  got  a  taste  of 
the  sweet  morsel  inside,  he  quickly  began  to  stuff 
the  whole  nuts  into  his  pockets  and  carry  them  to 
his  storehouse.  It  was  amusing  to  see  him  struggle 
with  the  larger  nuts,  first  moistening  them  with  his 
tongue,  to  force  them  into  those  secret  and  appar- 
ently inadequate  pockets.  The  smooth,  trim  cheeks 
would  suddenly  assume  the  appearance  of  enormous 
wens,  extending  well  down  on  the  sides  of  the  neck. 
The  pouches  are  not  merely  passive  receptacles; 
they  evidently  possess  some  power  of  muscular  ac- 
tion, like  the  throat  muscles,  which  enables  them  to 
force  the  grain  and  nuts  along  their  whole  course. 

18 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

As  the  little  squirrel  picks  the  corn  from  the  floor 
you  can  see  the  pouches  swell,  first  on  the  one  side, 
then  on  the  other.  He  seems  to  pick  up  the  kernels 
and  swallow  them.  What  part  the  tongue  plays  in 
the  process,  one  cannot  see.  In  forcing  a  whole  or  a 
half  hickory-nut  into  them,  the  chipmunk  uses  his 
Daws.  The  pouches  are  doubtless  emptied  by  mus- 
cular movements  similar  to  those  by  which  they 
were  filled  —  a  self-acting  piece  of  machinery,  a 
pocket  that  can  fill  and  empty  itself. 

I  see  my  little  hermit  making  frequent  visits  to 
my  study  in  the  morning  before  I  am  seated  there, 
exploring  the  floor,  the  chair,  the  table,  to  see  if  the 
miracle  of  the  corn  manna  has  not  again  happened. 
He  is  anxious  to  be  on  hand  as  soon  as  it  occurs.  He 
is  no  discriminator  of  persons.  One  morning  a  wo- 
man friend  took  her  seat  in  my  chair  with  corn  in 
her  lap  and  under  her  arched  hand  on  the  table, 
and  waited.  Presently  the  little  forager  appeared 
and  climbed  to  her  lap,  and  pushed  under  her  hand, 
as  he  had  under  mine.  Another  woman  sat  on  the 
cot  a  few  feet  away,  and  the  two  conversed  in  low 
tones.  The  squirrel  gave  little  heed  to  them,  but 
any  movement  of  their  hands  or  feet  startled  him. 
One  day  I  shifted  my  position  from  the  table  to 
near  the  cot,  with  my  extended  feet  near  the  en- 
trance. The  squirrel  was  in  the  act  of  coming  in 
when  I  made  some  slight  movement.  With  that 
characteristic  chippering  of  his,  he  retreated  hast- 

19 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

ily  to  the  first  apple-tree  twenty  feet  away,  and, 
perched  upon  its  leaning  trunk,  sounded  his  little 
alarm,  "  Chuck,  chuck,'*  for  fifteen  minutes  or  more. 
Apparently  he  had  but  just  discovered  me.  After  a 
time  he  came  slyly  back  and  resumed  his  foraging. 

The  activity  of  the  chipmunk  when  he  is  out  of 
his  den  is  almost  incessant.  Like  the  honey-bee,  he 
seems  filled  with  a  raging  impulse  to  lay  up  his  win- 
ter stores.  When  he  finds  an  ever-renewed  supply, 
as  in  my  orchard  camp,  his  eagerness  and  industry 
are  delightful  to  see.  The  more  nuts  I  place  for  him, 
the  more  eager  he  becomes,  as  most  of  us  do  when  we 
strike  a  rich  lead  of  the  things  we  are  in  quest  of. 
Will  his  greed  carry  him  to  the  point  of  filling  his 
den  so  full  that  there  remains  no  room  for  himself 
in  it?  Will  he  let  the  god  of  plenty  turn  him  out  of 
doors?  Last  summer  I  had  seen  a  chipmunk's  hole 
filled  up  with  choke-cherries  to  within  three  inches 
of  the  top.  ("Naturally,  being  choke-cherries,"  says 
a  friend,  looking  over  my  shoulder.) 

From  previous  experience  I  calculated  the  capa- 
city of  his  chamber  to  be  not  more  than  four  or 
five  quarts.  One  day  I  gave  him  all  I  thought  he 
could  manage,  —  enough,  I  fancied,  to  fill  his  cham- 
ber full,  —  two  quarts  of  hickory-nuts  and  some 
corn.  How  he  responded  to  the  invitation !  How  he 
flew  over  the  course  from  my  den  to  his !  He  fairly 
panted.  The  day  might  prove  too  short  for  him,  or 
some  other  chipmunk  might  discover  the  pile  of 

20 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

treasures.  Three,  and  often  four,  nuts  at  a  time, 
went  into  his  pockets.  If  one  of  them  was  too  large 
to  go  in  readily,  he  would  take  it  between  his  teeth. 
He  would  first  bite  off  the  sharp  point  from  the  nut 
to  keep  it  from  pricking  or  irritating  his  pouches. 
I  do  not  think  he  feared  a  puncture.  I  renewed  the 
pile  of  nuts  from  time  to  time,  and  looked  on  with 
interest.  The  day  was  cloudy  and  wet,  but  he  ran 
his  express  train  all  day.  His  feet  soon  became 
muddy,  and  it  was  amusing  to  see  him  wash  his 
face  with  those  soiled  paws  every  time  he  emerged 
from  his  hole.  It  was  striking  to  see  how  much  like 
a  machine  he  behaved,  going  through  the  same  mo- 
tions at  the  same  points,  as  regularly  as  a  clock.  He 
disappeared  into  his  hole  each  time  with  a  peculiarly 
graceful  movement  which  seemed  to  find  expression 
in  the  sweep  of  his  tail.  It  was  to  the  eye  what 
melodious  sounds  are  to  the  ear,  and  contrasted 
strangely  with  the  sudden  impulsive  movements  of 
his  usual  behavior.  When  he  emerged,  the  top  of  his 
head  and  eyes  first  appeared,  then  a  moment's 
pause,  then  the  head  and  neck  arose,  then  the  whole 
body  shot  up  in  the  erect  posture  with  the  paws 
folded  and  hanging  down  on  the  white  breast.  The 
face-washing  was  the  next  move,  first  the  mouth, 
then  the  nose  and  cheeks.  Then,  after  a  swift  glance 
around,  off  he  goes,  with  tail  well  up  in  the  air,  for 
another  load. 

As  the  day  declined,  and  the  pile  of  nuts  was  ever 

21 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

renewed,  I  thought  I  saw  signs  that  he  was  either 
getting  discouraged  or  else  that  his  den  was  getting 
too  full.  At  five  o'clock  he  began  to  carry  the  nuts 
out  from  my  camp  and  conceal  them  here  and  there 
under  the  leaves  and  dry  grass.  His  manner  seemed 
imdecided.  He  did  not  return  to  his  den  again  while 
I  waited  near  it.  After  some  delay  I  saw  him  go  to 
the  stone  wall  and  follow  it  till  he  was  lost  from  sight 
under  the  hill.  I  concluded  that  his  greed  had  at 
last  really  turned  him  out  of  doors  and  that  he  had 
gone  off  to  spend  the  night  with  a  neighbor.  But  my 
inference  was  wrong.  The  next  day  he  was  back 
again,  carrying  away  a  fresh  supply  of  nuts  as  eag- 
erly as  ever.  Two  more  quarts  disappeared  before 
night.  The  next  day  was  rainy,  and  though  other 
chipmunks  were  hurrying  about,  my  little  miser 
rested  from  his  labors.  A  day  later  a  fresh  supply  of 
nuts  arrived  —  two  quarts  of  chestnuts  and  one  of 
hickory-nuts,  and  the  greed  of  the  little  squirrel 
rose  to  the  occasion.  He  made  his  trips  as  fre- 
quently as  ever. 

My  enforced  absence  for  a  few  days  prevented  me 
from  witnessing  all  that  happened,  but  a  friend  took 
notes  for  me.  He  tried  to  fool  the  chipmunk  with  a 
light-colored  marble  placed  among  the  nuts.  The 
squirrel  picked  it  up,  but  quickly  dropped  it. 
Watching  his  opportunity,  my  friend  rubbed  the 
marble  with  the  meat  of  a  hickory-nut.  The  chip- 
munk smelled  it;  then  put  it  in  his  pocket;  then 

2^ 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

took  it  out,  held  it  in  his  paws  a  moment  and  looked 
at  it,  and  returned  it  to  his  pocket.  Three  times  he 
did  this  before  rejecting  it.  Evidently  his  sense  of 
taste  discredited  his  sense  of  smell. 

On  my  return  at  the  end  of  the  week,  the  enthusi- 
asm of  the  chipmunk  had  greatly  abated.  He  was 
seldom  out  of  his  den.  A  nut  or  two  plaxied  at  its 
entrance  disappeared,  but  he  visited  me  no  more  in 
my  camp.  Other  chipmunks  were  active  on  all  sides, 
but  his  solicitude  about  the  winter  had  passed,  or 
rather  his  hoarding  instinct  had  been  sated.  His 
cellar  was  full.  The  rumor  that  right  here  was  a 
land  of  plenty  seemed  to  have  gone  abroad  upon  the 
air,  and  other  chipmunks  appeared  upon  the  scene. 
Red  squirrels  and  gray  squirrels  came,  but  we 
wasted  no  nuts  upon  them.  A  female  chipmunk 
that  came  and  occupied  an  old  den  at  my  doorstep 
was  encouraged,  however.  She  soon  became  as 
familiar  as  my  first  acquaintance,  climbing  to  my 
table,  taking  nuts  from  my  hand,  and  nipping  my 
fingers  spitefully  when  I  held  on  to  the  nuts.  Her 
behavior  was  as  nearly  like  that  of  the  other  as  two 
peas  are  alike.  I  gave  her  a  fair  supply  of  winter 
stores,  but  did  not  put  her  greed  to  the  test. 

So  far  as  I  have  observed,  the  two  sexes  do  not 
winter  together,  and  there  seems  to  be  no  sort  of 
camaraderie  between  them.  One  day,  earlier  in  this 
history,  I  saw  my  male  neighbor  chase  a  smaller 
chipmunk,  which  I  have  little  doubt  was  this  female, 

23 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

out  of  the  camp  and  off  into  the  stone  wall,  with 
great  spitefulness.  All-the-year-round  love  among 
the  wild  creatures  is  very  rare,  if  it  occurs  at  all. 
Love  is  seasonal  and  brief  among  most  of  them. 
My  little  recluse  has  ample  supplies  for  quite  a 
family,  but  I  am  certain  he  will  spend  the  winter 
alone  there  in  the  darkness  of  his  subterranean 
dwelling.  He  must  have  at  least  a  peck  of  nuts  that 
we  gave  him,  besides  all  the  supplies  that  he  carried 
in  from  his  foraging  about  the  orchard  and  the  fields 
earlier  in  the  season.  The  temptation  to  dig  down 
and  uncover  his  treasures  is  very  great,  but  my  curi- 
osity might  lead  to  his  undoing,  at  least  to  his  seri- 
ous discomfort,  so  I  shall  forbear,  resting  content  in 
the  thought  that  at  least  one  fellow  mortal  has  got 
all  that  his  heart  desires. 

As  our  lives  have  touched  here  at  my  writing- 
table,  each  working  out  his  life-problems,  I  have 
thought  of  what  a  gulf  divides  my  little  friend  and 
me;  yet  he  is  as  earnestly  solving  his  problems  as  I 
am  mine;  though,  of  course,  he  does  not  worry  over 
them,  or  take  thought  of  them,  as  I  do.  1  cannot 
even  say  that  something  not  himself  takes  thought 
for  him;  there  is  no  thought  in  the  matter;  there  is 
what  we  have  to  call  impulse,  instinct,  inherited 
habit,  and  the  like,  though  these  are  only  terms  for 
mysteries.  He,  too,  shares  in  this  wonderful  some- 
thing we  call  life.  The  evolutionary  struggle  and 
unfolding  was  for  him  as  well  as  for  me.  He,  too,  is 

24 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

a  tiny  bubble  on  the  vast  current  of  animate  nature, 
whose  beginning  is  beyond  our  ken  in  the  dim  past, 
and  whose  ending  is  equally  beyond  our  ken  in  the 
dim  future.  He  goes  his  pretty  ways,  gathers  his 
precarious  harvest,  has  his  adventures,  his  hair- 
breadth escapes,  his  summer  activity,  his  autumn 
plenty,  his  winter  solitude  and  gloom,  and  his  spring 
awakening  and  gladness.  He  has  made  himself  a 
home  here  in  the  old  orchard;  he  knows  how  deep  to 
go  into  the  ground  to  get  beyond  the  frost-line;  he  is 
a  pensioner  upon  the  great  bounty  upon  which  we 
all  draw,  and  probably  lives  up  to  the  standard  of 
the  chipmunk  life  more  nearly  than  most  of  us  live 
up  to  the  best  standards  of  human  life.  May  he  so 
continue  to  live,  and  may  we  yet  meet  for  many 
summers  under  the  apple-boughs. 

Part  II 

When  the  spring  came  I  was  seized  with  a  curios- 
ity to  know  how  much  of  his  stores  my  little  friend 
had  disposed  of,  and  which  of  his  various  assortment 
of  nuts  and  grain  had  proved  his  favorites.  To  set- 
tle these  points  there  was  only  one  course  to  pursue : 
we  must  dig  him  out.  So  one  April  day  we  pro- 
ceeded to  do  so.  We  at  once  discovered  a  new  hole 
or  entrance,  only  a  few  inches  from  the  other,  and 
apparently  more  in  use  than  it  was.  We  foimd  his 
chamber  about  three  feet  below  the  surface  with 
its  usual  nest  of  dry  leaves  and  grass,  and  a  few 

25 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

shells  of  hickory-nuts  and  cherry-pits,  but,  dig  as  we 
would,  we  could  not  find  any  recess  or  granary  large 
enough  to  hold  the  peck  or  more  of  nuts  that  I  had 
seen  him  carry  in.  We  searched  carefully  for  side 
chambers  into  which  he  might  have  stored  the  sur- 
plus of  his  unexpected  harvest,  but  we  found  none. 
He  would  not  have  prepared  in  advance  for  such  a 
contingency,  as  he  could  have  had  no  hint  of  the 
bounty  which  a  designing  and  near-by  Providence 
was  to  bestow  upon  him. 

The  shells  we  found  accounted  for  only  a  small 
fraction  of  those  with  which  we  had  supplied  him. 
Not  a  chestnut  or  a  peach-pit  or  a  hickory-nut  did 
we  find,  nor  any  corn,  nor  wild  seeds  of  any  sort.  I 
was  much  puzzled,  and  am  still,  as  to  just  what  had 
happened.  The  chipmunk  either  had  been  plun- 
dered by  his  neighbors,  or  else  had  freely  distributed 
his  supplies  among  them.  What  did  the  new  hole 
signify?  The  old  one  was  ample,  and  led  to  the  same 
chamber.  We  did  not  find  the  chipmunk  in  his  den, 
nor  any  convincing  evidence  that  he  had  recently 
been  there.  Although  I  spent  the  following  summer 
in  the  same  bush  camp,  I  am  not  certain  that  I  ever 
saw  my  little  neighbor  that  season.  But  the  next  fol- 
lowing season,  he  or  another  was  again  my  neighbor 
under  the  apple-trees,  and  disclosed  to  me  a  refresh- 
ing bit  of  natural  history  —  that  of  a  chipmunk 
digging  his  hole.  He  came  and  dug  it  in  broad 
daylight  within  a  few  yards  of  my  bush  camp  under 

26 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

the  apple-trees,  and  gave  me  daily  opportunities 
to  watch  the  proceedings. 

I  have  never  known  any  one  who  has  been  so  for- 
tunate in  this  respect,  nor  have  I  ever  seen  in  print 
any  account  of  the  little  rodent's  proceedings  on 
such  an  occasion.  For  several  years  I  have  been  an 
observer  and  an  investigator  of  their  little  mounds 
of  freshly  dug  earth  along  the  margin  of  the  high- 
ways or  the  woody  borders  of  the  fields,  but  until 
now  have  never  caught  one  of  the  little  miners  at 
work.  I  had  fancied  that  the  digging  was  done  at 
night,  and  that  the  earth  was  carried  out  to  the 
dumping-place  in  the  cheek  pouches.  But  such  is  not 
the  case.  My  little  neighbor  worked  by  day,  and  his 
cheek  pockets  were  never  used  in  transporting  the 
earth  from  his  hole  to  the  dumping-place.  I  had 
often  found  the  pile  of  fresh  earth  two  or  three  yards 
from  the  hole  out  of  which  it  came,  with  never  a 
grain  of  soil  littering  the  grass  between  the  two,  and 
no  sign  of  a  trail.  I  had  also  been  fairly  bewildered 
by  finding  stones  in  the  pile  of  fresh  soil  so  large  that 
they  could  not  be  forced  back  into  the  hole  out  of 
which  I  was  sure  they  had  come.  On  three  occasions 
I  had  found  such  freshly  dug  stones,  and  they  were 
all  too  big  for  the  opening  that  led  to  the  chipmunk's 
den.  By  what  magic  had  he  got  them  out?  From 
what  I  had  seen  one  November,  after  the  earth  had 
been  frozen  and  then  thawed  once  or  twice,  I  con- 
cluded that  the  little  engineer  had  made  a  niche  in 

27 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

the  side  of  his  hole  just  deep  enough  to  make  room 
for  the  passage  of  these  broad,  flat  stones,  and  then 
had  packed  it  full  of  earth  again.  In  one  ease  where 
a  red  squirrel  had  apparently  been  trying  to  force 
an  entrance,  such  a  niche  was  disclosed,  as  if  the 
softer  earth  there  had  dropped  out.  Yet,  as  I  had 
found  other  holes  the  rims  of  w^hich  had  evidently 
never  been  tampered  with,  and  the  dump  of  which 
held  one  or  more  stones  larger  than  its  diam- 
eter, I  was  hopelessly  puzzled.  I  had  found  still 
other  holes  that  had  no  dump  at  all  —  not  a  grain 
of  fresh  earth  anywhere  in  their  neighborhood. 
There  is  one  by  the  roadside  in  front  of  Woodchuck 
Lodge  now,  eight  feet  from  the  stone  fence,  into 
which  the  chipmunk  is  daily  carrying  his  winter 
stores,  but  which  has  not  the  slightest  vestige  of  an 
earth-mound  anywhere  in  its  vicinity.  If  the  squir- 
rel ever  carried  the  dirt  away  in  his  cheek  pockets, 
I  might  conclude  that  he  had  scattered  it  along  the 
roadway.  This  mystery  of  the  holes  that  have  no 
visible  dumping-place  I  have  not  yet  cleared  up. 
Were  there  a  woodchuck-hole  near  any  of  them  I 
might  think  that  the  loosened  soil  had  been  shot 
into  that.  As  the  problem  stands i with  me  now,  it  is 
an  insoluble  mystery.  A  friend  suggests  that,  like 
the  Irishman,  he  probably  digs  another  hole  to  put 
the  earth  in,  which  reminds  me  of  an  old  story  about 
two  countrymen  who  tried  to  "stump"  each  other 
with  questions,  it  being  stipulated  that  no  question 

28 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

should  be  asked  that  could  not  be  answered  by  the 
propounder. 

*'How  is  it,'*  said  one,  "that  a  chipmunk  digs  a 
hole  without  throwing  out  any  dirt?" 

"You  can't  answer  that  yourself,"  said  the  other. 

"I  can;  he  begins  at  the  other  end  of  the  hole,'* 
replied  the  first. 

"How  does  he  get  to  the  other  end?"  asked  the 
second. 

"You  must  n't  ask  any  question  that  you  can't 
answer  yourself." 

It  is  certainly  true  that  in  such  cases  the  chip- 
munk did  begin  at  the  other  end  of  his  hole,  but  that 
end  must  be  somewhere  on  the  surface  of  the  ground. 
In  all  cases,  whether  there  is  a  pile  of  earth  or  not, 
the  hole  is  cut  up  through  the  turf  from  beneath, 
and  hence  all  the  soil  must  have  been  removed  back 
along  the  tunnel  and  out  at  the  entrance.  We  often 
see  the  same  thing  in  the  procedure  of  the  wood- 
chucks  —  the  large  pile  of  earth  at  the  mouth  of  the 
main  entrance  and  another  hole  a  few  yards  away 
which  has  been  cut  up  through  the  turf  from  below. 
The  woodchuck  makes  no  effort  at  concealment  as 
does  the  chipmunk,  but  apparently  aims  only  at 
convenience  and  safety.  But  how  the  squirrel  can 
dispose  of  a  bushel  of  soil  and  leave  no  trace  is  a 
problem.  The  mystery  of  the  large  stones  was  soon 
made  clear;  they  did  not  come  out  of  the  neat,  round 
hole  in  the  turf  through  which  the  squirrel  enters  or 

29 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

leaves  his  finished  den,  but  out  of  the  larger  work- 
hole  through  which  the  soil  was  removed,  and  which 
is  finally  stopped  up  and  obliterated. 

I  happened  to  discover  my  chipmunk  probably 
the  second  day  after  he  had  begun  to  dig.  Some 
people  were  calling  on  me  at  my  bush  camp  when, 
as  they  turned  to  go,  one  of  them  said,  **See  that 
chipmunk!"  I  looked  and  saw  him  sitting  up  amid 
a  little  fresh  earth,  washing  his  face.  His  face  cer- 
tainly needed  washing;  it  was  so  soiled  it  looked 
comical.  Presently  I  investigated  the  spot  and 
found  a  rude  hole  a  few  inches  deep,  with  the  loos- 
ened earth  in  front  of  it.  **  Evidently  a  greenhorn," 
I  said;  "a  pretty  dooryard  he  will  have  by  the  time 
he  finishes,  with  a  hole  big  enough  to  admit  a  red 
squirrel!" 

Next  morning  there  was  more  fresh  earth  in  front 
of  the  hole;  indeed,  the  grass  was  full  of  it  a  foot  or 
more  away,  and  a  dump-pile  had  just  been  begun. 
From  the  hole  to  this  pile  there  was  a  deep,  wide 
groove  in  the  loose  soil,  which  I  soon  saw  was  made 
by  the  squirrel  shoving  the  loosened  earth  from  the 
hole  to  the  dump,  using  his  nose  as  a  shovel.  Day 
after  day,  for  nearly  a  week  thereafter,  I  saw  him  at 
work,  digging  and  pushing  the  soil  up  to  the  mouth 
of  his  hole,  and  then  pushing  it  along  this  groove  or 
channel  to  the  dump-heap.  His  movements  were  so 
quick  and  energetic  that,  at  the  final  stroke,  the  soil, 
a  half-teaspoonful  or  more,  would  shoot  from  his 

30 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

nose  four  or  five  inches.  As  he  turned  back  along 
his  roadway  he  would  rapidly  paw  the  earth  behind 
him,  and  then,  before  entering  his  hole,  would  take 
a  quick  look  all  around.  He  was  never  for  a  moment 
off  guard ;  the  sense  of  danger  was  ever  present  with 
him.  As  he  entered  his  hole,  a  succession  of  quick 
jets  of  earth,  forming  little  parabolas  in  the  air, 
would  shoot  up  behind  him.  Then  all  would  be  still 
for  from  three  to  four  minutes,  when  he  would  again 
emerge,  shoving  the  soil  before  him  and  continuing 
to  butt  it,  quickly  glancing  right  and  left  the  while, 
till  he  shot  it  upon  his  dump. 

This  was  his  invariable  procedure.  Every  motion 
was  repeated  like  clockwork,  the  forward  shoving, 
the  retreating  pawing,  and  the  flying  spray  of  earth 
as  he  disappeared  in  his  hole. 

I  fancied  him  there  underground  loosening  the 
soil  with  his  paws,  for  two  or  three  minutes,  then 
either  kicking  it  up  toward  the  exit  or  else  shoving 
it  in  front  of  him.  When  at  work  he  was  intensely 
preoccupied;  only  one  other  feeling  seemed  to  pos- 
sess him  —  that  of  impending  danger.  One  day 
while  he  was  mining  beneath  the  surface,  I  sprinkled 
some  corn  and  pumpkin-seeds  along  his  highway 
and  in  the  mouth  of  his  hole,  but  when  he  came  to 
the  surface  with  his  burden  of  soil  he  heeded  them 
not;  he  shoveled  or  pawed  them  along  with  his  soil, 
and  buried  them  beneath  it.  The  incident  reminded 
me  of  the  hound  I  once  intercepted,  hot  on  the  trail 

31 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

of  a  fox;  I  offered  her  my  lunch  and,  holding  her, 
even  put  it  in  her  mouth,  but  she  threw  it  disdain- 
fully from  her,  and  rushed  on  along  that  steaming 
trail.  She  had  but  one  thought  or  sense  at  that  mo- 
ment: she  was  beside  herself  about  that  fox,  and 
her  attention  could  not  be  diverted  from  it.  My 
chipmunk  w^hen  at  work  was  alike  obsessed;  he 
knew  nothing  but  his  w  ork  and  the  danger  from  his 
enemies . 

Day  by  day  the  mound  of  fresh  earth  grew  and 
spread  back  more  and  more  toward  the  hole  out  of 
which  it  came,  till  it  seemed  about  to  cover  it.  At 
times  the  squirrel  either  worked  at  night  or  else  very 
early  in  the  morning  before  I  was  on  the  scene.  But 
later  he  was  not  on  his  job  till  past  mid-forenoon. 
For  two  or  three  days  he  promptly  appeared  at 
eleven  o'clock.  He  would  come  leaping  over  the 
grass  from  some  point  behind  my  camp  and  quickly 
resume  his  excavating.  Once  he  found  some  fresh 
peach-pits  upon  his  mound;  these  arrested  his  at- 
tention; he  seized  them  one  by  one,  nibbled  off  the 
bits  of  pulp  that  were  still  clinging  to  them,  then 
dropped  them  and  took  up  his  task.  He  usually 
knocked  off  work  by  or  before  two  in  the  afternoon. 

Evidently  he  has  no  partner  and  will  spend  the 
winter  in  his  subterranean  retreat  alone.  I  think 
this  is  an  established  chipmunk  custom,  rendered 
necessary,  it  may  be,  by  the  scant  supply  of  air  in 
such  close  quarters,  three  feet  undergroimd,  and 

32 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

maybe  under  three  or  more  feet  of  snow  in  addition. 
At  any  rate,  the  chipmunk,  male  or  female,  is  a 
hermit,  and  there  is  no  cooperation  or  true  sociabil- 
ity among  them.  They  are  wonderfully  provident 
and  industrious,  beginning  to  store  up  their  winter 
food  in  midsummer,  or  as  early  as  the  farmer  does 
his.  When  the  nut-crop  fails  them,  as  it  has  this 
present  season,  they  scour  about  the  neighborhood, 
gathering  all  sorts  of  wild  seeds  and  grains,  and 
wild-cherry  pits,  working  almost  as  steadily  as  do 
the  ants  and  the  bees.  In  the  mean  time  they  feed  on 
insects  and  berries  and  various  green  things,  but 
only  cured  grains  and  nuts  go  into  their  winter 
stores. 

The  wild  creatures  rarely  make  an  economic 
blunder.  We  are  told  on  excellent  authority  that 
the  coney,  or  least  hare,  in  the  Rocky  Mountains 
spreads  its  newly  cut  grass  and  other  green  food  on 
the  rocks  in  the  sun,  and  dries  it  as  carefully  as  the 
farmer  dries  his  hay  before  storing  it  up  for  winter 
use.  I  think  we  are  safe  in  saying  that  it  is  not  the 
coney's  individual  wisdom  or  experience  that 
prompts  him  to  do  this,  but  the  wisdom  of  some- 
thing much  older  than  he  is.  It  is  the  wisdom  of 
nature,  inherent  and  active  as  instinct. 

One  day,  when  I  paused  before  my  little  neigh- 
bor's mound  of  earth,  I  saw  that  the  hole  was 
nearly  stopped  up,  and,  while  I  was  looking,  the 
closure  was  completed  from  within.    Loose  earth 

33 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

was  being  shoved  up  from  below  and  pressed  into 
the  opening;  the  movement  of  the  soil  could  be 
seen.   It  flashed  upon  me  at  once  that  here  was 
the  key  to  the  secret  that  had  so  puzzled  me  —  he 
would  obliterate  that  ugly  and  irregular  work-hole 
and  the  littered  dooryard,  bury  them  beneath  his 
mound  of  earth,  and,  working  from  within,  would 
make  a  new  and  neater  outlet  somewhere  through 
the  turf  near  by.  He  was  probably  carrying  out  that 
scheme  at  that  moment,  and  was  disposing  of  the 
loose  earth  in  the  way  I  had  observed.    The  next 
day  the  mound  of  earth  had  been  extended  over  the 
place  where  the  hole  had  been,  and  the  chipmunk 
was  still  active  beneath  it,  pushing  up  fresh  earth 
like  a  ground-mole.   At  intervals  of  a  few  moments, 
the  fresh  soil  would  slowly  heave  or  boil  up,  as  it 
does  when  a  hidden  crayfish  or  mole  is  at  work. 
Twice  while  I  looked  the  head  of  the  digger  came 
through  the  thin  screen  of  earth,  as  if  by  accident; 
he  winked  and  blinked  as  the  dirt  slid  off  his  head 
and  over  his  eyes,  then  ducked  beneath  it  and  pro- 
ceeded with  his  work.    I  began  to  look  in  the  turf 
around  me  for  the  new  entrance  which  I  knew  would 
soon  be,  if  it  were  not  already,  made.  I  did  not  that 
day  find  it,  but  the  next  morning  there  it  was,  not 
more  than  four  inches  from  the  edge  of  the  dump- 
heap  —  a  little    round  shadow  under  the  grass- 
blades  and  wild-strawberry  leaves,  about  half  the 
size  of  the  work-hole,  with  no  stain  of  the  soil  about 

34 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

it,  and  having  such  a  look  of  neatness  and  privacy 
as  coidd  not  have  been  given  to  it  if  it  had  been 
made  from  without.  How  furtive  and  secretive  it 
looked !   Still  the  little  miner  kept  at  work,  still  the 
fresh  earth  boiled  up  above  the  old  entrance.   He  is 
excavating  his  chamber,  I  thought;  he  requires  a 
den  or  vault  down  there,  of  several  quarts'  capacity, 
in  which  to  build  his  nest    and    store  his  food. 
Whether  or  not  he  was  then  excavating  his  chamber 
and  storeroom,  the  next  day  I  found  two  more  new 
holes  in  the  turf,  one  a  foot  or  more  from  the  first 
one,  and  the  other  three  or  more  feet  away  in  an- 
other direction  —  both  of  them  having  the  same 
shy,  elusive  character.    Why  all  these  extra  holes? 
I  asked.  I  have  never  before  known  of  a  chipmunk's 
den  with  so  many  back  or  front  doors.    Are  they 
only  for  means  of  escape  if  robbers  or  miu-derers 
gain  an  entrance.^    If  so,  they  aiford  another  proof 
of  the  provident  cunning  of  our  little  striped  friend. 
It  happened  in  this  case  that  the  squirrel  brought 
to  the  surface  no  stones  too  large  for  the  new  en- 
trance, but  his  work-hole  was  so  large  and  irregular 
that  he  might  easily  have  done  so. 

My  chipmunk  was  engaged  for  nearly  three  weeks 
in  his  excavations.  I  knew  when  he  had  finished  by 
his  boldly  coming  into  my  camp  one  morning,  a 
minute  or  two  after  he  had  seen  me  enter  it.  Look- 
ing intently  up  in  my  face  for  a  few  seconds,  he  pro- 
ceeded to  stuff  his  mouth  with  the  dry  leaves  most 

35 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

to  his  liking  that  my  bushy  walls  afforded.  He  did 
not  try  to  pack  the  leaves  in  his  cheek  pouches,  but 
crammed  four  or  five  into  his  mouth  and  then  made 
off  to  his  den.  He  was  furnishing  his  house.  Many 
mouthfuls  of  dry  leaves  and  fine  grass  doubtless 
went  to  the  furnishing,  though  I  chanced  to  witness 
only  this  one.  His  bedroom  is  his  granary;  his 
winter  stores  are  packed  all  around  and  under  his 
nest.  Some  of  his  neighbors  have  been  carrying  in 
their  supplies  since  July,  just  what  I  could  not  find 
out;  probably  wild  seeds  of  some  kind.  As  there  are 
no  beech-nuts  this  season,  and  no  buckwheat  or  oat- 
fields  near  by,  I  am  wondering  what  mj^  little  neigh- 
bor is  counting  on  to  carry  him  over  the  winter.  He 
may  have  some  source  of  supply  that  I  know  not  of. 
I  gave  him  cherry-pits  and  plum-pits  from  time  to 
time  before  his  den  was  finished,  and  he  seemed  to 
have  some  place  to  store  them.  I  hope  he  is  not 
counting  too  confidently  upon  the  continuance  of 
this  bounty. 

In  my  walks  I  have  many  times  come  across  chip- 
munk-holes with  a  pile  of  earth  before  them,  and  a 
general  look  of  carelessness  and  disorder  all  about, 
and  I  have  said,  "That  squirrel  is  a  bungler;  he  is 
hot  equal  to  his  task."  The  present  season  I  have 
seen  three  such  holes  while  walking  less  than  a  mile 
along  the  highway.  They  appeared  to  have  been 
abandoned.  Now  I  know  they  were  only  begin- 
nings, and  that  had  the  owners  finished  their  man- 

36 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

sions,  they  would  have  presented  a  far  different 
appearance.  That  ugly  work-hole,  with  its  bclit- 
tered  dooryard,  would  have  been  completely  cov- 
ered up,  and  the  real  entrance  deftly  concealed. 

It  is  highly  improbable  that  every  individual 
chipmunk  has  a  way  peculiar  to  himself,  as  we  hu- 
mans so  often  have.  Their  dens  and  modes  of  pro- 
cedure in  digging  them  are  as  near  alike  as  two  peas, 
or  as  two  chipmunks  themselves.  Yet  there  remains 
the  mystery  of  an  occasional  hole  without  any  pile  of 
earth  anywhere  in  sight.  I  find  several  such  each  sea- 
son, and  I  can  offer  no  plausible  explanation  of  them. 

I  have  found  two  weasels*  dens  on  the  margin  of 
a  muck  swamp  in  the  woods  that  presented  the  same 
insoluble  problem  —  what  had  become  of  the  bushel 
or  more  of  earth  that  must  have  been  brought  to  the 
surface  .'^  Both  the  weasel  and  the  chipmunk  have 
several  galleries  and  one  or  more  large  chambers 
or  dining-halls,  and  how  each  manages  to  hide  or 
obliterate  all  the  loose  soil  that  must  have  been  re- 
moved is  a  question  which  has  long  puzzled  me.  If 
we  had  an  American  Fabre,  or  a  man  who  would 
give  himself  up  to  the  study  of  the  life-histories  of 
our  rodents,  with  the  same  patience  and  enthusiasm 
that  the  wonderful  Frenchman  has  had  for  the  life- 
histories  of  the  insects,  he  would  doubtless  soon 
solve  the  mystery  for  me. 

I  used  to  think  that  the  chipmunk  carried  away 
the  soil  in  his  cheek  pockets,  and  have  so  stated  in 

37 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

one  of  my  books,  but  I  am  now  very  certain  that  he 
does  not  —  only  his  food-stores  are  thus  carried.  In 
the  present  case  I  measured  the  excavated  earth  and 
found  it  a  plump  bushel. 

From  the  point  of  view  of  modern  scientific  phi- 
losophy, —  namely,  that  the  needs  of  the  organism 
beget  the  organ,  and  a  change  of  use  modifies  it,  — 
it  is  interesting  to  note  to  what  novel  use  the  chip- 
munk puts  his  nose  in  digging  his  den,  apparently 
without  changing  or  impairing  it  as  an  organ  of 
smell.  If  he  has  been  doing  this  through  biological 
ages,  using  it  as  a  kind  of  scoop  and  pusher,  is  it  not 
remarkable  that  it  has  not  undergone  some  modifi- 
cation that  would  make  it  better  suited  for  these  pur- 
poses.^ Note  the  shovel-footed  mole,  with  his  huge, 
muscular  fore  paws  with  which  he  forces  his  way 
through  the  soil  and  heaves  it  up  to  the  surface,  or 
the  pig  with  his  nose  so  well  adapted  to  rooting. 
The  nose  of  the  chipmunk  does  not  perceptibly  dif- 
fer from  that  of  the  other  squirrels,  which  do  no 
undergroimd  work.  Are  we  not  forced  to  the  con- 
clusion that  the  life-habits  of  the  chipmunk  have 
been  much  changed  since  the  country  has  been  so 
largely  denuded  of  its  forests,  thus  forcing  him  to 
become  a  dweller  in  the  open?  In  the  primitive 
woods,  with  the  thick  coating  of  leaves  and  of  snow 
upon  the  ground,  he  would  not  have  needed  to  pen- 
etrate the  earth  so  deeply.  The  wood  frogs  go  barely 
a  few  inches  under  the  leaves  and  leaf -mould,  where 

38 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

they  remain  unfrozen  all  winter.  Our  beech-woods 
to-day,  when  there  is  a  crop  of  nuts,  fairly  swarm 
with  chipmunks,  and  all  of  them  have  holes,  but 
rarely  is  there  any  sign  of  freshly  dug  earth. 

None  of  our  wild  creatures  have  as  yet  become 
much  modified,  either  in  form  or  color,  as  a  result  of 
the  change  in  their  environment  by  the  disappear- 
ance of  the  forests.  They  have  changed  in  habits, 
but  the  habits  have  not  as  yet  set  their  stamp  upon 
the  organism.  Is  it  not  probable  that  if  the  chip- 
munk goes  on  scooping  and  packing  soil  with  his 
nose  for  long  ages,  his  anatomy  will  in  time  become 
better  adapted  to  this  new  use.^ 

I  fancy  that  in  time  the  w^oodchuck,  which  from  a 
wood-dweller  has  now  so  commonly  become  a  den- 
izen of  the  fields,  will  change  in  color,  at  least.  How 
his  form  now  stands  out  on  the  smooth  surface  of 
the  green  fields !  His  enemies  can  see  him  from  afar. 
Is  this  the  reason  that  while  feeding  he  momentar- 
ily rises  up  on  his  hind  legs  and  takes  an  observa- 
tion? He  is  instinctively  uneasy  under  his  give-away 
color.  As  a  wood-dweller  his  colors  were  assimi- 
lative and  therefore  protective,  but  now  they  ad- 
vertise him  to  every  enemy  in  the  landscape.  In  the 
course  of  ages  he  should  become  a  much  lighter 
brown  or  gray  —  that  is,  if  our  theories  as  to  assimi- 
lative coloration  are  well  founded.  But  there  is  no 
doubt  but  that  use  and  wont  as  well  as  environment  do 
in  time  leave  their  stamp  upon  every  living  creature. 


II 

THE  FRIENDLY  ROCKS 

I  FIND  there  is  enough  of  the  troglodyte  in  most 
persons  to  make  them  love  the  rocks  and  the 
caves  and  ledges  that  the  air  and  the  rains  have 
carved  out  of  them. 

The  rocks  are  not  so  close  akin  to  us  as  the  soil; 
they  are  one  more  remove  from  us ;  but  they  lie  back 
of  all,  and  are  the  final  source  of  all.  I  do  not  sup- 
pose they  attract  us  on  this  account,  but  on  quite 
other  grounds.  Rocks  do  not  recommend  the  land 
to  the  tiller  of  the  soil,  but  they  recommend  it  to 
those  who  reap  a  harvest  of  another  sort  —  the  ar- 
tist, the  poet,  the  walker,  the  student  and  lover  of 
all  primitive  open-air  things. 

Time,  geologic  time,  looks  out  at  us  from  the 
rocks  as  from  no  other  objects  in  the  landscape. 
Geologic  time !  How  the  striking  of  the  great  clock, 
whose  hours  are  millions  of  years,  reverberates  out 
of  the  abyss  of  the  past!  Mountains  fall,  and  the 
foundations  of  the  earth  shift,  as  it  beats  out  the 
moments  of  terrestrial  history.  Rocks  have  literally 
come  down  to  us  from  a  foreworld.  The  youth  of 
the  earth  is  in  the  soil  and  in  the  trees  and  verdure 
that  springs  from  it;  its  age  is  in  the  rocks;  in  the 

40 


THE  FRIENDLY  ROCKS 

great  stone  book  of  the  geologic  strata  its  history  is 
written.  Even  if  we  do  not  know  our  geology,  there 
is  something  in  the  face  of  a  cliff  and  in  the  look  of  a 
granite  boulder  that  gives  us  pause  and  draws  us 
thitherward  in  oiu*  walk.  We  linger  beneath  the 
cliff,  or  muse  and  dream  amid  its  ruins  as  amid  the 
ruins  of  some  earth  temple;  we  pause  beside  the 
huge  boulder,  or  rest  upon  it  and  survey  the  land- 
scape from  its  coign  of  vantage;  we  lay  our  hand 
upon  it  as  upon  some  curious  relic  from  a  world  that 
we  know  not  of.  The  elemental,  the  primordial,  the 
silence  of  ages,  the  hush  and  repose  of  a  measureless 
antiquity  look  out  upon  us  from  the  face  of  the 
rocks.  "  The  menacing  might  of  the  globe  "  is  in  the 
cliffs  and  the  crags;  its  ease  and  contentment  are  in 
the  slumbering  boulders.  One  might  have  a  worse 
fate  than  to  have  his  lot  cast  in  a  rockless  country — • 
a  treeless  country  would  be  still  worse :  but  how  the 
emigrant  from  New  England  or  New  York  to  the 
prairie  States  or  to  the  cotton  States,  must  miss  his 
paternal  rocks  and  ledges!  A  prairie  farm  has  no 
past,  no  history  looks  out  of  it,  no  battle  of  the  ele- 
mental forces  has  been  fought  there,  and  only  a  very 
tame,  bloodless  battle  of  the  human  forces. 

A  landscape  without  rocks  lacks  something. 
Without  the  outcropping  ledge,  the  faces  of  the  hills 
lack  eyebrows;  without  a  drift  boulder  here  and 
there,  the  fields  lack  the  rugged  elemental  touch. 
Next  to  the  trees,  rocks  are  points  of  interest  in  the 

41 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

landscape.  Slumbering  here  and  there  upon  the 
turf,  they  enhance  the  sense  of  repose.  How  expres- 
sionless and  uninteresting  the  landscape  in  one  of 
the  prairie  States,  or  in  one  of  the  Southern  States, 
contrasted  with  a  New  England  or  a  New  York  farm ! 
The  grazing  or  ruminating  cattle  add  a  picturesque 
feature,  but  the  gray  granite  boulders  have  been  ly- 
ing there  chewing  their  stony  cuds  vastly  longer. 
How  meditative  and  contented  they  look,  dreaming 
the  centuries  away! 

The  rocks  have  a  history ;  gray  and  weather-worn, 
they  are  veterans  of  many  battles;  they  have  most 
of  them  marched  in  the  ranks  of  vast  stone  brigades 
during  the  ice  age;  they  have  been  torn  from  the 
hills,  recruited  from  the  mountain-tops,  and  mar- 
shaled on  the  plains  and  in  the  valleys;  and  now 
the  elemental  war  is  over,  there  they  lie  waging  a 
gentle  but  incessant  warfare  with  time,  and  slowly, 
oh,  so  slowly,  yielding  to  its  attacks !  I  say  they  he 
there,  but  some  of  them  are  still  in  motion,  creeping 
down  the  slopes,  or  out  from  the  clay-banks,  nudged 
and  urged  along  by  the  frosts  and  the  rains,  and  the 
sun.  It  is  hard  even  for  the  rocks  to  keep  still  m  this 
world  of  motion,  but  it  takes  the  hour-hand  of  many 
years  to  mark  their  progress.  What  in  my  child- 
hood we  called  *'the  old  pennyroyal  rock,"  because 
/)ennyroyal  always  gTew  beside  it,  has,  in  my  time, 
crept  out  of  the  bank  by  the  roadside  three  or  four 
feet.  When  a  rock,  loosened  from  its  ties  in  the  hills, 

42 


THE  FRIENDLY  ROCKS 

once  becomes  a  wanderer,  it  is  restless  ever  after, 
and  stirs  in  its  sleep.  Heat  and  cold  expand  and 
contract  it,  and  make  it  creep  down  an  incline. 
Hitch  your  rock  to  a  sunbeam,  and  come  back  in  a 
hundred  years,  and  see  how  much  it  has  moved.  I 
know  a  great  platform  of  rock  weighing  hundreds  of 
tons,  and  large  enough  to  build  a  house  upon,  that 
has  slid  down  the  hill  from  the  ledges  above,  and 
that  is  pushing  a  roll  of  turf  before  it  as  a  boat  pushes 
a  wave,  but  stand  there  till  you  are  gray,  and  you 
will  see  no  motion;  return  in  a  century,  and  you  will 
doubtless  find  that  the  great  rock  raft  has  pro- 
gressed a  few  inches.  What  a  sense  of  leisure  such 
things  give  us  hurrying  mortals ! 

One  of  my  favorite  pastimes  from  boyhood  up, 
when  in  my  home  country  in  the  Catskills,  has  been 
to  prowl  about  under  the  ledges  of  the  dark  gray 
shelving  rocks  that  jut  out  from  the  sides  of  the  hills 
and  mountains,  often  forming  a  roof  over  one's 
head  many  feet  in  extent,  and  now  and  then  shelter- 
ing a  cool,  sweet  spring,  and  more  often  sheltering 
the  exquisite  moss-covered  nest  of  the  phoebe-bird. 
These  ledges  appealed  to  the  wild  and  adventurous 
J  in  the  boy.  The  primitive  cave-dweller  in  me,  which 
is  barely  skin-deep  in  most  boys,  found  something 
congenial  there;  the  air  smelled  good;  it  seemed 
fresher  and  more  primitive  than  the  outside  air;  it 
was  the  breath  of  the  rocks  and  of  the  everlasting 
hills ;  the  home  feeling  which  I  had  amid  such  scenes 

43 


J 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

doubtless  dated  back  to  the  time  when  our  rude 
forebears  were  cave-dwellers  in  very  earnest.  The 
little  niches  and  miniature  recesses  in  the  rocks  at 
the  side  were  so  pretty  and  suggestive,  and  would 
have  been  so  useful  to  a  real  troglodyte.  Of  a  hot 
summer  Simday  one  found  the  coolness  of  the  heart 
of  the  hills  in  these  rocky  cells,  and  in  winter  one 
found  the  air  tempered  by  warmth  from  the  same 
source.  To  get  down  on  one's  hands  and  knees  and 
creep  through  an  opening  in  the  rocks  where  bears 
and  Indians  have  doubtless  crept,  or  to  kindle  a  fire 
where  one  fancies  prehistoric  fires  have  burned,  or  to 
eat  black  birch  and  wintergreens,  or  a  lunch  of  wild 
strawberries  and  bread  where  Indians  had  probably 
often  supped  on  roots  or  game  —  what  more  wel- 
come to  a  boy  than  that? 

As  a  man  I  love  still  to  loiter  about  these  open 
doors  of  the  hills,  playing  the  geologist  and  the 
naturalist,  or  half -playing  them,  and  half-dreaming 
in  the  spirit  of  my  youthful  days.  Phoebe-birds' 
nests  may  be  found  any  day  under  these  rocks,  but 
on  one  of  my  recent  visits  to  them  I  found  an  un- 
usual nest  on  the  face  of  the  rocks  such  I  had  never 
before  seen.  At  the  first  glance,  from  its  mossy 
exterior,  I  took  it  for  a  phcebe's  nest,  but  close  in- 
spection showed  it  to  be  a  mouse's  nest  —  the  most 
delicate  and  artistic  bit  of  mouse  architecture  I  ever 
saw  —  a  regular  mouse  palace;  dome-shaped,  cov- 
ered with  long  moss  that  grew  where  the  water  had 

44 


THE  FRIENDLY  ROCKS 

issued  from  the  rocks  a  few  yards  away,  and  set 
upon  a  little  shelf  as  if  it  had  grown  there.  There 
was  a  hole  on  one  side  that  led  to  the  soft  and  warm 
interior,  but  when  my  forefinger  called,  the  tiny 
aristocrat  was  not  in.  Whether  he  or  she  belonged 
to  the  tribe  of  the  white-footed  mouse,  or  to  that  of 
the  jumping  mouse,  I  could  not  tell.  Was  the  de- 
vice of  the  mossy  exterior  learned  from  the  phoebe.^ 
Of  course  not;  both  had  been  to  the  same  great 
school  of  Dame  Nature. 

Through  the  eyes  of  the  geologist  I  see  what  the 
agents  of  erosion  have  done,  how  the  tooth  of  time 
has  eaten  out  the  layers  of  the  soft  old  red  sand- 
stone, and  left  the  harder  layers  of  the  superimposed 
Catskill  rock  to  project  unsupported  many  feet.  I 
see  these  soft  red  layers  running  through  under  the 
mountains  from  valley  to  valley,  level  as  a  floor, 
and  lending  themselves  to  the  formation  of  the  beau- 
tiful waterfalls  that  are  foimd  here  and  there  in  the 
trout  brooks  of  that  region.  At  one  such  waterfall, 
a  mile  or  more  from  the  old  schoolhouse,  we  used  to 
go,  when  I  was  a  boy,  for  our  slate  pencils,  looking 
for  the  softer  green  streaks  in  the  crumbling  slaty 
sandstone,  and  trying  them  on  our  teeth  to  see 
whether  or  not  they  were  likely  to  scratch  our  pre- 
cious slates.  In  imagination  I  follow  this  slaty  layer 
through  under  the  mountains  and  see  where  it  is  cut 
into  by  other  waterfalls  that  I  know,  ten,  twenty, 
thirty  miles  away.   At  those  falls  the  water  usually 

45 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

makes  a  sheer  leap  the  whole  distance,  —  twenty, 
thirty,  or  fifty  feet,  as  the  case  may  be,  —  the  harder 
rock  at  the  top  always  holding  out  while  the  softer 
layers  retreat  beneath  it,  forming  in  this  respect  min- 
iature Niagaras.  When  near  one  of  these  falls  I 
seldom  miss  the  opportunity  to  climb  the  side  of  the 
gorge  under  the  overhanging  rock  and  inspect  its 
under  surface,  and  feel  it  with  my  hand.  The  ele- 
ments have  here  separated  the  leaves  of  the  great 
stone  book  and  one  may  read  some  of  the  history 
written  there.  When  I  pass  my  hand  over  the  bot- 
tom side  of  the  superincumbent  rock,  I  know  I  am 
passing  it  over  the  contours,  the  little  depressions 
and  unevennesses  of  surface,  of  the  mud  of  the  old 
lake  or  inland  sea  bottom,  upon  which  the  material 
of  the  harder  rock  was  laid  down  more  than  fifty 
milhons  of  years  ago.  There  are  here  and  there  little 
protuberances,  the  size  of  peas  and  beans,  which 
probably  mark  where  Uttle  gas  bubbles  were  in  the 
old  mud  bottom. 

One  thing  that  arrests  attention  in  such  a  place 
is  the  abruptness  of  the  change  from  one  species 
of  rock  to  another,  as  marked  and  sudden  as  a 
change  in  a  piece  of  masonry  from  brick  to  stone,  or 
from  stone  to  iron.  The  two  meet  but  do  not  min- 
gle. Nature  seems  suddenly  to  have  turned  over  a 
new  leaf,  and  to  have  begun  a  new  chapter  in  her 
great  stone  book.  What  happened.^  There  is  no 
evidence  in  this  region  of  crustal  disturbance  since 

46 


THE  FRIENDLY  ROCKS 

the  original  plateau  out  of  which  the  mountains 
were  carved  was  first  lifted  up  in  Palaeozoic  times, 
when  the  earth  was  in  her  teens.  The  indications 
are  that  on  some  quiet  day  the  peaceful  waters 
became  suddenly  charged  with  new  material  and 
the  streams  or  rivers  from  some  unknown  land 
in  the  vicinity  poured  it  into  the  old  Devonian 
lakes  where  it  hardened  into  rock.  The  changes 
indicated  by  these  streaks  of  soft  red  sandstone 
suddenly  alternating  with  the  hard  laminated  Cat- 
skill  formation,  well  up  the  mountain-sides,  with 
a  sharp  dividing  line  between  them,  occurred  many 
times  during  the  Devonian  Age.  During  one  geo- 
logic day  the  earth-building  forces  brought  one 
kind  of  material,  and  the  next  day  material  of 
quite  another  kind,  and  this  alternation  without 
any  change  of  character  seems  to  have  kept  up 
for  millions  of  years.  How  curious,  how  interest- 
ing! Both  from  near-by  land  surfaces,  and  yet  so 
different  from  each  other!  How  difficult  to  form 
any  mental  picture  of  the  condition  of  things  in 
those  remote  geologic  ages!  It  is  as  if  one  day 
it  had  snowed  something  like  brick-dust  to  a 
depth  of  many  feet,  and  the  next  day  it  had 
snowed  a  dark-gray  dust  of  an  entirely  different 
character,  and  that  this  alternation  of  storms  had 
kept  up  for  ages.  Long  before  we  reach  the  tops 
of  the  mountains,  or  at  about  a  thousand  feet 
above  the  river  valley,  the  red  soft  strata  cease, 

47 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

and  the  hard  dark,  cross-bedded  gray  rock  con- 
tinues to  the  top. 

In  the  higher  peaks  of  the  southern  Catskills  an- 
other kind  of  rock  begins  to  appear  before  the  sum- 
mit is  reached  —  a  conglomerate.  The  storm  of 
dark  snow  has  turned  to  a  storm  of  white  hail.  As 
you  go  up,  you  seem  to  be  climbing  into  a  shower  of 
quartz  pebbles.  Presently  you  begin  to  see  here  and 
there  a  pebble  embedded  in  the  rocks;  then,  as  you 
go  on,  you  see  more  of  them,  and  still  more;  it  is  hke 
the  first  sprinkle  of  rain  that  precedes  the  shower, 
till,  long  before  you  reach  the  summit,  the  regular 
downpour  begins,  the  rocks  become  solid  masses  of 
pebbles  embedded  in  a  gray  hard  matrix;  there  are 
many  hundreds  of  feet  of  them.  On  the  top  the  soil 
is  mainly  sand  and  coarse  gravel  from  the  disinte- 
grated rock. 

The  streams  at  the  foot  of  the  mountains  abound 
in  fragments  of  this  pudding-stone  or  conglomerate, 
and  in  the  hard,  liberated  quartz  pebbles.  These 
pebbles  were  rolled  on  an  ancient  sea-beach  incalcu- 
lable ages  ago,  and  now  they  are  being  rolled  and 
worn  again  by  the  limpid  waters  of  the  Catskill 
trout-brooks.  What  varied  fortune  the  whirligig  of 
time  brings  to  quartz  pebbles  as  well  as  to  men! 

Of  course  the  Catskills  were  under  water  when 
this  conglomerate  was  laid  down  upon  them.  The 
coal  age  was  near  at  hand,  and  a  conglomerate  akin 
to  this  of  the  tops  of  the  Catskills  underlies  the  coal 

48 


THE  FRIENDLY  ROCKS 

measures.  The  Catskill  plateau  was  lifted  up  before 
Carboniferous  times  began,  so  that  there  is  no  coal 
in  this  region.  We  should  have  to  look  overhead  for 
it  instead  of  underfoot.  When  the  Catskill  plateau 
rose  above  the  waters,  Pennsylvania  and  most  of 
the  continent  to  the  west  was  under  the  sea,  receiv- 
ing additional  deposits,  thousands  of  feet  thick  in 
many  places,  and  in  due  time  supporting  a  vegeta- 
tion that  gave  us  our  vast  deposits  of  coal. 

The  geologic  tornado  that  brought  this  hailstorm 
of  quartz  pebbles,  so  marked  in  the  conglomerate 
that  caps  the  highest  Catskills,  seems  to  have  been 
a  general  storm  over  a  large  part  of  the  northern 
hemisphere,  as  this  conglomerate  underlies  the  coal 
measures,  both  in  this  country  and  in  Europe.  It 
must  have  occurred  in  late  Devonian  or  early  Car- 
boniferous times.  On  the  top  of  Lookout  Mountain, 
in  Tennessee,  I  gathered  a  handful  of  pebbles  that 
had  weathered  out  of  the  Carboniferous  sandstone 
that  the  ages  have  exposed  on  the  summit. 

An  earlier  storm  of  quartz  pebbles  occurred  in 
Silurian  times,  which  formed  the  Oneida  conglom- 
erate in  central  New  York,  and  the  Shawangunk 
range  in  southern  New  York.  This  latter  range  is  a 
vast  windrow  made  up  of  small  pebbles  varying  in 
size  from  peas  to  large  beans,  cemented  together  by 
quartz  sand.  It  is  several  hundred  feet  thick  and 
runs  southwest  through  Pennsylvania  into  Virginia, 
affording  another  proof  of  the  abundance  of  quartz 

49 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

rock  in  those  early  geologic  ages.  Dana  thinks  this 
conglomerate  gives  us  an  idea  of  the  seashore  work  of 
that  period.  Only  on  a  seashore  could  the  crushed  ma- 
terial have  been  sorted  and  distributed  in  this  way. 
According  to  the  published  views  of  a  natural 
philosopher  on  the  Pacific  Coast,  this  rain  of  rock 
material  from  the  heavens  is  no  myth.  He  believes 
that  the  earth  in  its  early  history  was  surrounded 
by  a  series  of  numerous  concentric  rings  of  floating 
cosmic  matter,  like  the  rings  of  Saturn,  and  that 
from  time  to  time  these  rings  collapsed  and  their 
material  fell  to  earth  helping  to  make  up  the  vast 
series  of  stratified  rocks.  This  theory  certainly  sim- 
plifies some  of  the  problems  of  the  geologist.  My 
Catskills  did  not  have  to  go  down  under  the  sea  to 
get  this  coat  of  mail  of  quartz  pebbles,  or  these  al- 
ternate layers  of  red  and  gray  sandstone,  and  the 
question  of  the  abrupt  ending  and  beginning  of  the 
different  series  is  easily  solved;  as  is  also  the  larger 
question  of  where  all  the  diverse  material  of  our 
enormous  system  of  stratified  rock,  reckoned  by  some 
geologists  to  be  not  less  than  twenty  miles  thick  in 
North  America,  came  from.  In  some  parts  of  Scot- 
land, the  old  red  sandstone,  according  to  Geikie,  is 
twenty  thousand  feet  thick.  This  explanation  of 
the  California  theorist  gives  us  all  this  material,  and 
gives  it  in  the  original  packages.  I  wish  I  could 
believe  it  true  —  and  be  thankful  that  there  are  no 
more  rings  to  collapse ! 

50 


THE  FRIENDLY  ROCKS 

How  one  would  like  to  know  the  history  of  tliis 
conglomerate  that  caps  the  higher  Catskills !  What 
stone-crusher  reduced  the  quartz  rock  and  sorted 
the  fragments  so  evenly?  The  stone-crushing  plant 
that  turned  out  the  material  for  most  of  the  other 
rocks  ground  "exceeding  fine,"  but  in  this  instance 
they  turned  out  a  very  coarse  product,  though  a 
very  uniform  one.  On  the  shores  of  some  Palaeozoic 
sea  have  these  pebbles  been  rolled  and  worn.  Only 
upon  one  sea-beach  have  I  seen  pebbles  of  this  size 
in  lieu  of  sand,  and  that  was  upon  Dover  beach,  on 
the  coast  of  England.  Instead  of  the  hissing  of  the 
sands  when  the  breakers  come  in,  there  rises  the 
sound  of  the  multitudinous  rattling  of  these  myr- 
iads of  pebbles.  Some  old  Devonian  seashore  has 
sent  up  a  like  sound  where  these  Catskill  pebbles 
were  washed  by  the  waves. 

The  rock-crushing  plants  must  have  been  very 
busy  in  the  early  geologic  ages,  and  quartz  rock 
must  have  been  a  drug  in  the  market.  We  see  no 
natural  forces  at  work  now  reducing  rocks  to  coarse 
gravel  on  any  scale  comparable  to  that  which  must 
have  taken  place  in  Silurian  times  when  the  Shaw- 
angunk  rocks  and  the  Oneida  conglomerate  were 
laid  down.  In  any  case,  where  were  the  quartz 
mountains  from  which  they  came,  and  where  were 
the  forces  that  ground  them  up?  "From  lands  to 
the  eastward,"  geologists  think,  but  of  such  lands 
there  are  no  traces  now. 

51 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

On  the  Pacific  Coast  of  southern  CaHfornia  I  saw 
a  strip  of  country  nearly  a  hundred  miles  long  and 
from  fifteen  to  twenty  miles  wide  that  was  mainly 
made  up  of  large  quartz  pebbles.  The  land  was 
thrown  into  gentle  hills  and  ridges  which  became 
higher  as  they  approached  the  mountains.  Near  its 
inland  margin  I  heard  of  a  search  for  oil  that  had 
been  made  there,  the  drill  going  through  nine  hun- 
dred feet  of  pebbles  and  striking  the  granite  rock  — 
an  unlikely  place  for  oil.  But  think  of  the  quartz 
mountains  that  must  have  been  broken  up  and  put 
through  the  mill  of  the  Pacific  to  form  all  the  vast 
banks  of  water- worn  pebbles ! 

In  South  America  Darwin  saw  hills  and  moun- 
tains of  pure  quartz.  Not  far  from  Buenos  Ayres 
they  formed  tablelands  or  mesas,  without  cleavage 
or  stratification.  On  the  Falkland  Islands  he  found 
the  hills  of  quartz  and  the  valleys  filled  with 
*' streams  of  stone"  —  huge  fragments  of  quartz 
rock  varying  in  size  from  a  few  feet  in  diameter  "to 
ten  or  even  more  than  twenty  times  as  much." 
Darwin  thinks  that  these  streams  of  quartz  stones 
may  have  had  their  origin  in  streams  of  white  lava 
that  had  flowed  from  many  parts  of  the  mountains 
into  the  valleys,  and  then,  when  solidified,  were 
rent  by  some  enormous  convulsion  into  myriads  of 
fragments.  Some  such  titanic  force  of  nature  must 
have  been  the  stone-crusher  that  converted  vast 
hills  of  quartz  into  the  fragments  that  make  up  the 

52 


THE  FRIENDLY  ROCKS 

Shawangunk  Mountains,  the  Oneida  conglomerate, 
and  the  conglomerate  on  the  tops  of  the  Catskills. 

In  our  Northern  States  there  are  two  classes  of 
rocks:  the  place  rocks,  and  the  wanderers,  or  drift 
boulders.  The  boulders  are  in  some  ways  the  more 
interesting;  they  have  a  story  to  tell  which  the  place 
rock  has  not;  they  have  drifted  about  upon  a  sea  of 
change,  slow  and  unwilling  voyagers  from  the  North 
many  tens  of  thousands  of  years  ago;  now  they  lie 
here  in  the  fields  and  on  the  hills,  shipwrecked  mar- 
iners, in  some  cases  hundreds  of  miles  from  home. 
But  usually  they  have  been  plucked  from  the  neigh- 
boring ledges  or  mountains,  and  shoved  or  trans- 
ported to  where  they  now  lie.  In  nearly  all  cases  the 
sharp  points  and  angles  have  been  rubbed  down,  as 
with  most  travelers,  and  they  lie  about  the  fields 
like  cattle  ruminating  upon  the  ground. 

**The  shadow  of  a  great  rock  in  a  weary  land  "  is 
pretty  sure  to  be  the  shadow  of  a  drift  boulder.  The 
rock  about  which,  and  on  which,  we  played  as  chil- 
dren was  doubtless  a  drift  boulder;  the  rocks  be- 
neath which  the  woodchucks  and  the  foxes  burrow 
are  drift  boulders;  the  rock  under  the  spreading 
maples  where  the  picnickers  eat  their  lunch  is  a 
drift  boulder;  the  rock  that  makes  the  deep  pool  in 
the  trout-stream  of  your  boyhood  is  a  drift  boulder; 
the  rocks  which  you  helped  your  father  pry  up  from 
the  fields  and  haul  to  their  place  for  the  "rock  bot- 
tom" of  the  stone  wall,  in  the  old  days  on  the  farm, 

53 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

were  all  drift  boulders.  How  sod-bound  many  of 
them  were,  and  how  the  old  oxen  used  to  settle  into 
their  bows  with  rigid  muscles  in  pulling  them  from 
their  beds!  If  you  had  looked  on  their  under  sides 
you  would  have  seen  how  smoothed  and  worn  most 
of  them  were.  They  had  been  hauled  across  the 
land  by  oxen  of  another  kind  long  before  yours 
were  heard  of. 

The  rocks  that  give  the  eyebrows  to  the  faces  of 
the  hills  are  place  rocks  —  the  cropping-out  of  the 
original  strata.  The  place  rock  gives  the  contour  to 
the  landscape ;  it  forms  the  ledges  and  clijff s ;  it  thrusts 
a  huge  rocky  fist  up  through  the  turf  here  and  there, 
or  it  exposes  a  broad  smooth  surface  where  you  may 
see  the  grooves  and  scratches  of  the  great  ice  sheet, 
tens  of  thousands  of  years  old.  The  marks  of  the  old 
ice-plane  upon  the  rocks  weather  out  very  slowly. 
When  they  are  covered  with  a  few  inches  of  soil 
they  are  as  distinct  as  those  we  saw  in  Alaska  under 
the  edges  of  the  retreating  glaciers. 

One  day,  on  the  crest  of  a  hill  above  my  Lodge  on 
the  home  farm  in  the  Catskills,  I  used  my  spade  to 
remove  five  or  six  inches  of  soil  from  the  upper  layer 
of  rock  in  order  to  prove  to  some  doubting  friends 
that  a  page  of  history  was  written  here  that  they 
had  never  suspected.  I  quickly  disclosed  the  lines 
and  the  grooves,  nearly  as  sharp  as  if  made  but  yes- 
terday, and  as  straight  as  if  drawn  by  a  rule,  running 
from  northeast  to  southwest.   Across  the  valley,  a 

54 


THE  FRIENDLY  ROCKS 

third  of  a  mile  away,  I  uncovered  other  rock  sur- 
faces on  the  same  level,  that  showed  a  continuation 
of  the  same  hues.  The  great  jack-plane  had  been 
shoved  across  the  valley  and  over  the  mountain- 
tops  and  had  taken  off  rocky  shavings  of  unknown 
thickness. 

The  drift  boulders  are  not  found  beyond  the 
southern  limit  of  the  great  ice-sheet  —  an  irregular 
line  starting  a  little  south  of  New  York  and  running 
westward  to  the  Rocky  Mountains,  but  in  southern 
California  I  saw  huge  granite  boulders  that  looked 
singularly  like  New  England  drift  boulders.  They 
cover  the  hill  called  Rubidoux  at  Riverside.  I  over- 
heard a  tourist  explaining  to  his  companions  how 
the  old  glaciers  had  brought  them  there,  apparently 
ignorant  of  the  fact  that  they  were  far  beyond  the 
southern  limit  of  the  old  ice-sheet.  It  is  quite  evi- 
dent that  they  were  harder  masses  that  had  weath- 
ered out  of  the  place  rock  and  had  slowly  tumbled 
about  and  crept  down  the  hill  under  the  expansive 
power  of  the  sun's  rays.  But  I  saw  one  drift  boulder 
in  southern  California  that  was  a  puzzle;  it  was  a 
water-worn  mass  of  metamorphic  rock,  nearly  as 
high  as  my  head,  at  the  end  of  a  valley,  several 
miles  in  among  the  hills,  with  no  kindred  rocks  or 
stones  near  it.  It  was  evidentlj^  far  from  home,  but 
what  its  means  of  transportation  had  been  I  could 
only  conjecture. 

Amid  the  flock  of  gray  and  brown  boulders  that 

55 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

dot  my  native  fields,  there  is  here  and  there  a  black 
sheep  —  a  rough-coated    rock   much  darker  than 
the  rest,  which  the  farmers  call  firestone,  mainly,  I 
suppose,  because  it  does  not  break  or  explode  in 
the  fire.   It  is  a  kind  of  conglomerate,  probably 
what  the  geologists  call  breccia,  made  up  of  the  con- 
solidated smaller  fragments  of  older  crushed  rocks. 
The  material  of  which  it  is  composed  is  of  unequal 
hardness,  so  that  it  weathers  very  rough,  present- 
ing a  surface  deeply  pitted  and  worm-eaten,  which 
does  not  offer  an  inviting  seat.    These  rocks  wear  a 
darker  coat  of  moss  and  lichens  than  the  others  and 
seem  like  interlopers  in  the  family  of  field  boulders. 
But  they  really  belong  here;  they  have  weathered 
out  of  the  place  strata.  Here  and  there  one  may  find 
their  dark  worm-eaten   fronts  in  the  outcropping 
ledges.   They  were  probably  formed  of  the  coarser 
material  —  a   miscellaneous    assortment    of   small 
thin  water-worn  fragments  of  rocks  and  mud  and 
coarse  sand  —  that  accumulated  about  the  mouths 
of  the  streams  and  rivers  which  flowed  into  the  old 
Devonian  lakes  and  seas.   They  are  not  made  up  of 
thin  sheets  like  the  other  rocks,  and  seem  as  if  made 
at  a  single  cast.    They  are  as  rough-coated  as  alli- 
gators, and  do  not,  to  me,  look  as  friendly  as  their 
brother  rocks.  They  stand  the  fire  better  than  other 
stone.  The  huge  stone  arch  in  my  father's  sugar 
bush,  in  which  the  great  iron  kettles  were  hung,  was 
largely  built  of  these  stones.  I  think  the  early  set- 

56 


THE  FRIENDLY  ROCKS 

tiers  used  them  to  line  the  open  fireplaces  in  their 
stone  chimneys.  Along  the  Hudson  they  used  slate, 
which  is  also  nearly  fireproof. 

I  know  a  huge  iron-stone  rock  lying  at  the  foot  of  a 
hill,  from  beneath  which  issues  one  of  the  coldest 
and  sweetest  springs  in  the  neighborhood.    How  the 
haymakers  love  to  go  there  to  drink,  and  the  grazing 
cattle  also !  Of  course,  the  relation  of  the  rock  to  the 
spring  is  accidental.    The  rocks  help  make  the  his- 
tory of  the  fields,  especially  the  natural  history. 
The  woodchucks  burrow  beneath  them,  and  trees 
and  plants  take  root  beside  them.    The  delightful 
pools  they  often  form  in  a  trout-stream  every  angler 
remembers.    Their  immobility  makes  the  mobile 
water  dissolve  and  excavate  the  soil  around  and  be- 
neath them,  and  afford  lairs  for  the  big  trout.    I 
know  of  a  large  one  that  stood  on  the  edge  of  the 
road  where  it  snubbed   the  wagon-wheels  as  they 
came  along.   For  generations  it  had  defied  the  road- 
menders,  till  one  June  day  a  farmer  of  more  pluck 
and  endurance  than  usual  tackled  it  with  a  heavy 
crowbar,  and,  after  a  prolonged  effort,  split  off  a 
huge  slab  from  its  top,  making  it,  as  the  path-master 
said,  "haul  in  its  horns."    When  a  boy  I  saw  my 
elder  brother  drill  a  hole  in  one  with  a  churn  drill, 
and  with  a  charge  of  powder  blast  it  into  four  pieces, 
which  were  used  in  the  foundation  of  a  wall  by  the 
roadside.  As  I  pass  along  that  road  now,  after  sixty- 
five  years,  I  see  the  square  faces  of  that  rock  with  a 

57 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

section  of  the  drili-hole  on  the  corner  of  each,  and 
think  of  my  brother.  It  was  before  the  time  of  fuses, 
and  I  remember  he  primed  the  blast  by  the  spindle 
method,  and  then  laid  a  train  of  powder  with  a  frag- 
ment of  paper  at  the  end  of  it.  A  lighted  match  was 
touched  to  the  paper,  and  then  we  ran  to  a  safe  dis- 
tance as  fast  as  our  legs  could  carry  us. 

How  geologic  time  looks  out  from  the  ledges  and 
walls  of  gray  rocks  unmindful  of  us  human  ephem- 
era that  pass !  It  has  seen  the  mountains  decay  and 
the  hills  grow  old.  The  huge  drift  boulders  rest  on 
the  margin  of  meadows  and  fields,  or  stand  sentry 
to  the  woods,  and  though  races  and  kingdoms  pass, 
scarcely  the  change  of  a  wrinkle  disturbs  their  calm 
stone  faces.  Yet  time  gets  the  better  of  them  also. 
The  frowning  ledge  melts  as  inevitably  as  a  snow- 
bank. 

Geologic  time  is  the  most  potent  of  the  gods  of 
change.  He  wields  an  invisible  hammer  beside  which 
the  hammer  of  Thor  is  a  child's  toy.  Its  slow,  silent 
blows  break  in  through  granite  rocks  as  big  as  a 
house.  The  traveler  sees  them  along  the  road  when 
he  enters  Yosemite;  he  may  see  them  in  New  Eng- 
land; he  may  see  them  on  Lake  Mohonk,  or  on  the 
Shawangunk  Mountains  in  New  York  —  sheer 
cleavage  of  rock-masses  from  fifty  to  one  hundred 
feet  through  —  a  clean  break  while  the  huge  frag- 
ment of  the  mountain  is  lying  where  it  fell.  It  is 
as  if  the  sunbeams  or  starbeams  did  it,  as  if  the 

58 


THE  FRIENDLY  ROCKS 

snows  of  winter  and  the  dews  of  summer  had  the 
force  of  dynamite. 

When  I  get  especially  rock -hungry,  and  the  trog- 
lodyte in  me  gets  restless,  as  he  is  apt  to  in  all  of  us, 
I  take  a  walk  to  the  ledges  on  Pine  Hill,  or  on  Hem- 
lock Ridge,  and  prowl  about  their  caverns  and 
loiter  under  their  overhanging  strata,  putting  my 
hand  in  the  little  niches  and  pockets  where  I  kept 
my  trinkets  and  choice  possessions  when  I  was  a 
troglodyte,  inspecting  the  phoebe's  mossy  nest  on  a 
little  shelf  where  the  four-footed  beasts  cannot 
reach  it,  cleaning  out  the  spring  that  shows  like  a 
small  eye  under  the  rocky  eyebrow,  creeping  through 
what  we  boys  called  the  "Indian  oven." 

When  you  want  to  read  a  stirring  and  heroic 
chapter  in  the  great  rock  volume  of  the  earth,  the 
very  Iliad  or  Odyssey  of  the  rocks,  go  to  the  Grand 
Canon  of  the  Colorado,  or  to  Yosemite.  As  you 
gaze,  a  sentence  from  Job  may  come  to  your  mind 
as  it  did  to  a  friend  of  mine —  "Where  wast  thou 
when  I  laid  the  foundations  of  the  earth?" 

All  through  the  Southwest  the  great  book  of  geo- 
logic Revelation  lies  open  to  the  traveler  in  an  as- 
tonishing manner.  Its  massive  but  torn  and  crum- 
pled leaves  of  limestone,  sandstone,  and  basalt  lie 
spread  out  before  him  all  through  Colorado,  New 
Mexico,  and  Arizona,  and  he  may  read  snatches  of 
the  long  geologic  record  from  the  flying  train. 

I  myself  need  not  go  so  far  to  see  what  time  can 

59 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

do  with  the  rocks.  On  the  Shawangunk  range  of 
mountains  in  my  own  State  are  scenes  that  suggest 
a  rocky  Apocalypse.  It  is  as  if  the  trumpet  of  the 
last  day  had  sounded  here  in  some  past  geologic 
time.  The  vast  rock-strata  of  coarse  conglomerate, 
hundreds  of  feet  thick,  has  trembled  and  separated 
into  huge  blocks,  often  showing  a  straight,  smooth 
cleavage  like  the  side  of  a  cathedral.  As  a  matter  of 
fact,  I  suppose  there  was  no  voice  of  the  thunder  or 
of  earthquake  that  wrought  this  ruin,  but  the  still 
small  voice  of  heat  and  cold  and  rain  and  snow. 
There  is  no  wild  turmoil  or  look  of  decrepitude,  but 
a  look  of  repose  and  tranquillity.  The  enormous 
four-square  fragments  of  the  mountain  stand  a  few 
feet  apart,  as  if  carefully  quarried  for  a  tower  to 
reach  the  skies.  In  classic  simplicity  and  strength,  in 
harmony  and  majesty  of  outline,  in  dignity  and  se- 
renity of  aspect,  I  do  not  know  their  equal.  They 
are  truly  Greek  in  their  composure  and  restraint 

—  impressive,  like  a  tragedy  of  ^Eschylus,  in  their 
naked  grandeur.  No  confusion  of  tumbled  and  piled 
fragments,  no  sublimity  of  wreckage  and  disorder, 
but  the  beauty  of  simplicity,  the  impressiveness  of 
power  in  repose. 

What  a  diverse  family  is  this  of  the  stratified 
rocks !  Never  did  the  members  of  the  human  family 

—  Caucasian,  Negro,  Jew,  Japanese,  Indian,  Es- 
kimo, Mongohan  —  differ  more  from  one  another 
than  do  the  successive  geological  formations.  White 

60 


THE  FRIENDLY  ROCKS 

and  black,  hard  and  soft,  coarse  and  fine,  red  and 
gray,  yet  all  in  the  same  line  of  descent  —  all  dating 
back  to  the  same  old  Adam  rock  of  the  Azoic  period. 
Time  and  circumstance,  conditions  of  water  and  air, 
of  sea  and  land,  seem  to  have  made  the  difference. 
As  the  races  of  men  were  modified  and  stamped  by 
their  environment,  so  the  diverse  family  of  rocks 
reflects  the  influence  of  both  local  and  general  con- 
ditions. When  analyzed,  their  constituents  do  not 
differ  so  much.  As  in  the  different  races  of  men  we 
find  the  same  old  flesh  and  blood  and  bones,  so  in  the 
rocks  w^e  find  the  same  quartz  sand  and  compounds 
of  lime  and  iron  and  potash  and  magnesia  and  feld- 
spar, yet  in  quantity  and  character  what  a  world  of 
difference!  How  differently  they  are  bedded,  how 
differently  they  weather,  how  differently  they  sub- 
mit to  the  hammer  and  chisel  of  the  mason  and  the 
stonecutter!  Some  rocks  seem  feminine,  smooth, 
fine-grained,  fragile,  the  product  of  deep,  still  water; 
others  are  more  masculine,  coarse,  tough,  the  prod- 
uct of  waters  more  or  less  turbid  or  shallow. 

The  purity  of  the  strain  of  the  different  breeds 
of  rocks  is  remarkable;  about  as  little  crossing  or 
mingling  among  the  different  systems  as  there  is 
among  the  different  species  of  animals:  considering 
the  blind  warring  and  chaos  of  the  elements  out  of 
which  they  came,  one  can  but  wonder  at  the  homo- 
geneity of  the  different  kinds.  They  are  usually  as 
uniform  as  if  their  production  had  been  carefully 

61 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

watched  over  by  some  expert  in  the  business, — 
which  is,  indeed,  the  case.  This  expert  is  water.  Was 
there  ever  such  a  sorter  and  sifter?  See  the  vast 
clay-banks,  as  uniform  in  quahty  and  texture  as  a 
snow-bank,  slowly  built  up  in  the  privacy  of  deep, 
still  rivers  or  lakes  during  hundreds  or  thousands 
of  years,  implying  a  kind  of  secrecy  and  seclusion 
of  nature.  Mountains  of  granite  have  been  ground 
down  or  disintegrated,  and  the  clay  washed  out  and 
carried  in  suspension  by  the  currents,  till  it  was 
impounded  in  some  lake  or  basin,  and  then  slowly 
dropped.  The  great  clay-banks  and  sand-banks  of 
the  Hudson  River  Valley  doubtless  date  from  the 
primary  rocks  of  the  Adirondack  region.  Much  of 
the  quartz  sand  is  still  in  the  soil  of  that  region,  and 
much  of  it  is  piled  up  along  the  river-banks,  but 
most  of  the  clay  has  gone  downstream  and  been 
finally  deposited  in  the  great  river  terraces  that  are 
now  being  uncovered  and  worked  by  the  brickmak- 
ers.  The  sand  and  the  clay  rarely  get  mixed;  the 
great  hydraulic  machine  turns  out  a  pretty  pure  pro- 
duct. The  occasional  mingling  of  sand  and  gravel 
shows  that  at  times  the  workmen  nodded,  but  the 
wonder  is  that,  on  the  whole,  the  two  should  be  so 
thoroughly  separated,  and  so  carefully  deposited, 
each  by  itself.  Flowing  water  drops  its  coarser  ma- 
terial first,  the  sand  next,  and  the  mud  and  silt 
last.  Hence  the  coarser-grained  rocks  and  conglom- 
erates are  built  up  in  shallow  water  near  shore,  the 

62 


THE  FRIENDLY  ROCKS 

sandstones  in  deeper  water,  and  the  slates  and  argil- 
laceous rocks  in  deeper  still.  The  limestone  rocks, 
which  are  of  animal  origin,  also  imply  deej),  calm 
seas  during  periods  that  embrace  hundreds  and  thou- 
sands of  centuries.  It  is,  then,  the  long  ages  of  peace 
and  tranquillity  in  the  processes  of  the  earth-build- 
ing forces  that  have  contributed  to  the  homogeneity 
of  the  different  systems  of  secondary  rocks.  What 
peace  must  have  brooded  over  that  great  inland  sea 
when  those  vast  beds  of  Indiana  limestone  and  sand- 
stone were  being  laid  down !  A  depth  of  thousands  of 
feet  of  each  without  a  flaw.  Vast  stretches  of  Cam- 
brian and  Silurian  and  Devonian  time  were  appar- 
ently as  free  from  violent  movements  and  warrings 
of  the  elements  as  in  our  own  day. 

Occasionally  in  a  system  of  rocks  one  may  see  a 
change  of  color  over  a  considerable  area,  as  from 
gray  or  brown  to  red,  with  small  fragments  of  older 
and  redder  rocks  embedded  in  them.  I  fancy  such 
streaks  were  caused  by  a  sudden  flood  or  freshet  that 
carried  new  material  worn  from  a  distant  land-sur- 
face into  the  sea  or  into  the  impounded  waters. 

It  would  seem  to  require  as  distinctly  an  evolu- 
tionary process  to  derive  our  sedimentary  rocks 
from  the  original  igneous  rocks  as  to  derive  the 
vertebrate  from  the  invertebrate,  or  the  mammal 
from  the  reptile.  Of  course,  it  could  not  be  done  by 
a  mechanical  process  alone.  It  has  been  largely  a 
chemical  process  and,  no  doubt,  to  a  certain  extent, 

63 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

a  vital  process  also.  The  making  of  a  loaf  of  bread 
is,  up  to  a  certain  point,  a  mechanical  process;  then 
higher  and  finer  processes  set  in.  And  all  the  cake 
and  pastry  and  loaves  in  the  bakeshop  do  not  differ 
from  the  original  bin  of  wheat  any  more  than  the 
great  family  of  secondary  rocks  differs  from  the  un- 
milled  harvest  of  the  earth's  original  crust.  And  the 
increase  in  bulk  seems  to  have  been  quite  as  great 
as  that  which  the  bin  of  wheat  undergoes  in  passing 
from  the  kernel  to  the  loaf  or  the  roll.  The  leaven 
that  went  to  the  making  of  our  shale  and  sandstone 
loaves  seems  to  have  been  contributed  by  the  sea 
when  the  batch  was  mixed  and  baked.  Little  doubt 
that  the  bulk  of  the  material  of  the  sedimentary 
rocks  came  through  the  process  of  erosion  and  depo- 
sition from  the  original  igneous  rocks,  but  how  has 
it  expanded  and  augmented  during  the  process !  It 
seems  to  have  swelled  almost  as  the  inorganic  swells 
in  passing  into  the  organic. 


Ill 

THE  IVIASTER  INSTINCT 

FROM  the  naturalist's  point  of  view,  the  sole 
purpose  of  all  forms  of  life  in  this  world,  man 
included,  is  to  beget  more  life,  and  secure  the  per- 
petuity of  the  species.  The  master  instinct  in  every 
living  creature  is  to  increase  and  multiply  and  fill 
the  w^orld  with  its  progeny.  Our  dream  that  every 
living  thing  was  made  to  serve  some  namable  pur- 
pose apart  from  itself,  or  was  designed  in  some  way 
to  serve  man,  is  a  notion  that  has  survived  from  the 
childhood  of  the  race. 

Many  forms,  in  both  the  animal  and  the  vegetable 
worlds,  are  the  enemies  of  man  and  the  enemies  of 
one  another.  Other  forms  play  into  one  another's 
hands,  but  only  to  help  forward  the  scheme  of  prop- 
agation of  one  or  both  sides,  as  when  vines  and  trees 
incase  their  seeds  in  tempting  fruit-pulps  which  the 
animals  eat  and  thus  drop  the  undigested  germs  far 
and  near.  All  our  fruits,  from  the  apple  down  to  the 
wild  berries,  are  plotting  to  get  their  seeds  scattered 
and  planted,  and  they  offer  edible  morsels  as  a  wage 
to  any  creature  that  will  perform  this  service.  In 
many  cases  the  wage  is  a  very  small  one,  as  with  the 
red  cedar,  the  hardback  {Celtis),  the  sumac,  the 

65 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

poison-ivy,  and  the  like;  but  it  serves  the  purpose; 
the  hungry  birds  are  quick  to  lend  a  hand.  If  the 
plants  and  vines  and  trees  had  minds  and  could 
answer  our  question  as  to  what  is  passing  in  them, 
they  would  say:  "We  are  thinking  how  best  to  per- 
petuate our  species  —  how  to  attract  the  insects  to 
visit  the  flowers,  and  thus  secure  a  hardier  race  by 
cross-fertilization ;  how  to  tempt  the  birds  and  four- 
footed  creatures  to  come  and  sow  our  seeds;  how  to 
protect  these  seeds  and  nuts  till  they  are  ripe  and 
ready  to  pass  along  the  precious  heritage  of  life; 
hence  some  of  us  trust  to  the  winds  and  the  waters 
to  secure  fertilization,  in  which  cases  we  do  not  need 
to  develop  bright  or  showy  flowers,  but  a  super- 
abundance of  pollen;  for  sowing  our  seeds,  some  of  us 
devise  wings  and  balloons;  others  devise  hooks  and 
hands  that  seize  upon  passing  animals;  others  make 
use  of  the  tension  of  springs  and  other  mechanical 
devices.  We  heavy-nut-bearing  trees  enter  into 
partnership  with  squirrels  and  crows  and  jays;  they 
carry  our  nuts  to  distant  woods  and  fields;  some 
they  carelessly  drop  by  the  way,  some  they  hide 
under  the  leaves  or  in  the  grass,  and  we  find  our 
account  in  each.  They  unwittingly  plant  more  oaks 
and  chestnuts  and  hickory-trees." 

Nearly  all  the  animal  orders  below  man  are 
equally  obsessed  with  the  idea  of  perpetuating  their 
species;  for  this  they  live,  for  this  they  die.  It  is  a 
kind  of  madness;  it  leads  to  all  kinds  of  excesses  and 

66 


THE  MASTER  INSTINCT 

extravagances:  bizarre  colors  and  ornaments,  gro- 
tesque forms  and  weapons,  fantastic  rites  and  cere- 
monies. The  sexual  instinct  emboldens  the  timid, 
and  spurs  the  sluggard;  it  sharpens  the  senses,  it 
quickens  the  wits,  it  makes  even  the  frogs  and  toads 
musical,  and  gives  new  life  to  the  turtle.  In  fact,  the 
drama  of  all  life  revolves  around  the  breeding-in- 
stinct. It  is  this  that  fills  the  world  with  music, 
color,  perfume.  The  nuptials  of  the  vegetable  world 
are  celebrated  with  lovely  forms,  brilliant  hues,  and 
sweet  incense.  With  the  birds  they  are  attended  by 
joyous  songs,  gay  plumes,  dances  and  festive  re- 
unions, and  striking,  if  at  times  grotesque,  forms. 
With  the  insects,  music  and  gay  colors  mark  the  day; 
with  the  human  race,  how  much  of  our  song  and  art 
and  pursuit  of  beauty  has  grown  out  of  the  instinct 
to  please  and  win  the  opposite  sex!  Without  this 
incentive  —  the  mating  instinct,  the  love  of  chil- 
dren, and  of  home  and  fireside  —  could  we  ever  have 
attained  to  our  present  civilization? 

What  is  the  meaning  of  the  spring  and  summer 
chorus  of  bird-songs  —  the  ecstasy  of  larks  and 
finches,  the  madness  of  nightingales,  the  melody  of 
thrushes,  the  intoxication  of  bobolinks  and  mocking- 
birds —  the  jewels  in  the  plumage,  the  fantastic  in 
behavior  —  but  sexuality,  the  innate  desire  for  off- 
spring? How  Nature  surrounds  this  passion  with 
the  gay,  the  festive,  the  hilarious!  how  she  aids  it 
with  color  and  form!  how  she  lavishes  upon  it  all  her 

67 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

arts  to  charm  and  persuade  and  entice!  Her  crea- 
tures forget  their  staid  and  quiet  ways;  there  is  a 
sound  of  music  and  gayety  on  the  one  hand,  and  a 
noise  of  strife  and  battle  on  the  other.  The  stag 
bugles  and  tosses  his  horns,  the  bull  bellows  and 
tears  and  paws  the  earth,  the  grouse  drums  and 
booms,  the  woodpecker  beats  a  spring  reveille  on  a 
dry  limb,  the  insects  fiddle  and  shuflBe  and  snap  their 
wings  —  indeed,  nearly  all  forms  of  life  assume  new 
activity  and  intensity. 

It  is  the  sex  principle  that  gives  the  beard  to  the 
man,  the  antlers  to  the  stag,  the  mane  to  the  lion, 
the  spurs  and  comb  to  the  cock,  and  the  strange 
fashions  and  coloration  to  the  male  birds.  Repro- 
duction is  the  one  thing  Nature  has  most  at  heart 
and  is  intent  on  securing  at  all  hazards  —  at  the 
hazard  of  pain,  hunger,  strife,  and  seK-destruction. 

Just  to  keep  up  the  game  of  life,  to  keep  the 
measure  full  to  overflowing  —  has  Nature  any  other 
purpose  than  this?  Think  of  the  swarms  of  the  liv- 
ing that  come  and  go,  especially  in  the  insect  world, 
and  leave  no  trace  behind !  Yes,  and  at  times,  in  the 
higher-animal  world.  Think  of  the  hordes  of  lem- 
mings that  at  intervals  appear  in  northern  Europe, 
and  move  through  the  land  devastating  the  farm- 
ers* crops,  till  they  reach  the  sea,  into  which  they 
plunge  and  are  drowned.  Ships  are  said  to  sail  at 
times  through  miles  of  lemmings,  swimming  they 
know  not  whither. 

68 


THE  MASTER  INSTINCT 

Behold  the  birds  building  their  nests  in  spring; 
how  absorbed,  how  persistent  they  are!  How  al- 
most impossible  it  is  to  defeat  or  discourage  them! 
Any  one  who  has  tried  to  prevent  English  sparrows 
from  breeding  on  his  premises  soon  learns  what  a 
difficult  task  he  has  undertaken.  Equally,  any  one 
who  charges  himself  to  see  to  it  that  no  burdocks  or 
red-root,  or  other  troublesome  weeds,  mature  their 
seeds  on  his  farm  or  about  his  grounds,  finds  out 
what  enterprise  and  hardihood  he  is  trying  to  thwart. 
Cut  the  plebeian  burdock  down  within  a  few  inches 
of  the  ground  and  keep  it  cut  down,  shorn  of  all  its 
big  leaves,  and  yet  in  August  or  September,  without 
the  support  of  any  foliage,  it  will  push  out  and  de- 
velop burs  in  the  axils  of  its  old  leaves.  I  have  seen 
masses  of  burs  thus  form  about  the  stem  half  as 
large  as  one's  fist.  The  plant  was  making  a  last  and 
supreme  effort  to  perpetuate  itself.  Most  garden 
weeds  behave  in  the  same  way.  As  the  summer 
nears  its  end,  and  their  earlier  efforts  to  form  seeds 
have  been  thwarted,  they  seem  to  become  alarmed, 
and  to  make  a  last  heroic  effort,  probably  drawing 
upon  the  last  grain  of  material  stored  in  the  root  and 
stalk  to  develop  the  precious  germ. 

Fruit-trees,  starved  or  in  an  unhealthy  condition, 
seem  to  be  seized  with  the  same  alarm  and  overload 
themselves  with  small,  inferior  fruit.  Is  it  not  no- 
torious that  men  and  women  suffering  from  certain 
slow,  wasting  diseases  are  exceptionally  prolific.'^  On 

69 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

the  other  hand,  plants  and  animals  overfed  or 
exceptionally  prosperous  seem  to  forget  the  primal 
command. 

The  birds,  I  repeat,  are  not  easily  discouraged. 
In  April  of  the  past  year  a  pair  of  phoebe-birds  built 
their  exquisite  mossy  nest  in  a  niche  in  the  rocks  at 
the  entrance  to  my  natural  cellar  at  Slabsides.  It 
was  a  nest  in  the  best  style  of  the  phoebe's  art,  built 
unhurriedly,  as  all  first  nests  of  the  season  usually 
are.  Like  the  plant,  the  bird  does  not  hurry  till  the 
season  gets  late.  One  snow-white  egg  was  laid,  when, 
on  a  visit  to  me  of  some  schoolboys,  the  nest  acci- 
dentally came  to  grief;  it  was  detached  from  the 
rock  upon  which  the  bird  had  so  carefully  masoned 
it.  I  replaced  the  nest,  but  its  foundations  had  been 
loosened,  and  the  winds  dislodged  it.  The  phoebes 
then  began  a  nest  on  a  timber  under  the  little  shed. 
One  day  I  found  this  dislodged  and  its  material 
pulled  apart  on  the  ground  beneath.  Who  or  what 
Vandal  or  Hun  of  the  woods  did  it,  whether  a  red 
squirrel  or  an  owl  or  other  violator  of  its  neighbor's 
rights,  I  know  not.  But  the  phoebes  did  not  lose  heart. 
When  I  discovered  the  second  calamity  that  had 
befallen  them,  they  were  already  at  work  building 
the  third  nest,  and  —  what  was  very  unusual  —  were 
using  the  material  of  the  nest  just  destroyed.  Bit  by 
bit  the  mother  bird  was  gathering  it  up  and  recon- 
structing her  "procreant  cradle."  I  hoped  a  third 
disaster  would  not  befall  the  pair,  and  it  did  not, 

70 


THE  MASTER  INSTINCT 

but  if  it  had,  not  later  than  June,  they  would  prob- 
ably have  built  still  another  nest.  The  phoebes  usu- 
ally rear  two  broods  in  a  season  when  all  goes  well 
with  them.  It  is  to  build  the  nest  and  rear  the  young 
that  they  have  made  the  long  and  hazardous  jour- 
ney from  our  Southland,  or  even  from  Central 
America,  and  it  is  this  that  will  cause  them  to  make 
it  every  spring  as  long  as  they  live.  It  is  this  that 
impels  myriads  of  other  small  birds  and  water-fowl 
to  make  the  same  trip  from  the  Far  South,  braving 
storms  and  winds  and  other  perils  by  land  and  sea. 
To  beget  progeny  that  will  in  time  reproduce  them- 
selves is  the  unconscious  and  unquenchable  motive 
that  actuates  them  all.  This  same  motive  impels 
the  golden  plover  to  make  its  marvelous  flight  from 
the  plains  of  Patagonia  to  the  Arctic  Circle  in 
Alaska,  a  distance  of  nearly  half  the  circumference 
of  the  globe,  crossing  oceans  without  a  rest.  It  sends 
the  European  migrants  across  the  Mediterranean 
from  Africa  to  France,  many  of  them  so  fatigued  on 
reaching  land  that  they  fall  an  easy  prey  to  man  and 
beast. 

It  is  the  impelling  force  of  this  motive  or  instinct 
that  sends  the  fish  up  the  streams  and  rivers  in  the 
spring,  making  the  waters  alive  with  denizens  from 
the  sea,  impelling  the  salmon  to  leap  falls,  or,  failing 
to  scale  them,  to  keep  up  the  effort  till  they  die  from 
exhaustion.  The  breeding-instinct  is  the  ruler  of  life. 
It  asks  no  questions,  it  requires  no  guarantee,  it 

71 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

pauses  at  no  obstacles.  It  sends  races  of  men  and 
animals  to  seek  new  lands;  it  fills  nations  with  the 
desire  for  expansion,  kindles  in  them  the  earth- 
hunger,  and  is  often  the  chief  factor  in  devastating 

wars. 

In  man  the  sexual  passion  is  stronger  than  all 
others;  it  rules  his  life,  it  has  made  his  history. 
Consciously  or  unconsciously,  he  hves  for  his  pos- 
terity. He  wages  wars  to  plant  colonies  or  to  con- 
quer territory  from  his  enemies,  in  which  his  race 
may  expand  and  increase.  His  eye  is  ever  on  the 
future;  he  is  looking  out  for  his  children  and  his  chil- 
dren's children.  Nine  tenths  of  the  life  of  woman 
centres  around  the  idea  of  making  herself  attractive 
to  the  opposite  sex.  This  is  the  meaning  of  all  the 
modes  and  fashions  —  of  the  monstrous  hats,  the 
hobble-skirts,  the  preposterous  shoes,  the  paint,  the 
jewelry,  the  feathers,  the  frippery  and  the  furbelows, 
the  immodest  exposures,  the  exaggerations  and  ac- 
centuations, and  all  the  bewildering  arts  and  devices 
by  which  woman  seeks  to  enhance  her  feminine 
charms. 

The  social  dances,  old  and  new,  though  the  par- 
ticipants may  be  all  unconscious  of  it,  are  as  literally 
sexual,  and  have  as  direct  reference  to  the  old  com- 
mand to  be  fruitful  and  multiply  and  replenish  the 
earth,  as  do  the  dances  and  aerial  evolutions  of  the 
birds  and  the  wild  fowl.  Fine  clothes,  like  fine 
feathers,  all  point  in  the  same  direction.  Male  pride 

?2 


THE  IVIASTER  INSTINCT 

and  female  pride  do  not  differ  in  their  genesis  or 
natural  history  from  the  pride  displayed  in  barn- 
yards and  in  the  fields  and  woods  —  it  is  all  the  out- 
come of  the  old  command  to  increase  and  multiply 
—  it  is  the  masterful  desire  of  one  sex  to  make  it- 
self attractive  to  the  opposite. 

A  great  number  of  insect  forms  die  as  soon  as  they 
have  fulfilled  the  Biblical  injunction.  This  is  true 
of  all  the  ephemera,  and  at  least  one  form  of  verte- 
brates, the  lampreys;  these  perish  as  soon  as  they 
have  spawned. 

The  cockchafer  dies  in  a  month  after  completing 
its  metamorphosis.  The  seventeen-year  locusts  and 
the  grasshoppers  live  but  a  short  time  after  they 
have  deposited  their  eggs.  Nature  has  no  further 
use  for  them.  Many  of  the  moths  deposit  their  eggs 
within  twenty-four  hours  after  they  escape  from  the 
chrysalis-case,  and  then  very  soon  die.  Many  kinds 
of  flies  live  only  four  or  five  hours  —  just  long 
enough  to  lay  their  eggs.  As  soon  as  a  drone  of  the 
hive-bee  has  fertilized  the  queen,  the  swarm  has  no 
further  use  for  the  whole  tribe  of  drones  and  they 
are  mercilessly  killed  or  expelled  from  the  hive. 
Nature  displays  the  same  superabundance  of  the 
fertilizing  principle  in  such  cases  that  she  does  in  the 
trees  and  plants  that  cast  their  pollen  upon  the  wind. 
This  is  to  offset  the  element  of  chance.  The  services 
of  only  one  drone  is  required,  but  the  swarm  develoi)s 
scores  of  them  to  make  sure  that  at  least  one  male 

73 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

may  meet  the  queen  while  she  is  coursing  at  random 
on  her  nuptial  flight  through  the  upper  air. 

Speaking  of  the  queen  of  the  hive-bee  reminds  me 
how  literally  the  life  of  the  hive  revolves  around  her. 
The  queen's  moral  support  of  the  swarm,  so  to 
speak,  is  vital.  If  any  accident  befall  her,  in  the  case 
of  a  new  swarm  before  it  has  established  itseK,  the 
whole  mass  of  worker  bees  instantly  becomes  de- 
moralized; the  swarm  loses  heart,  and  gradually 
perishes  without  making  any  attempt  to  start  a  new 
colony.  The  members  seem  to  know  instinctively 
that  there  can  be  no  increase,  and  that  their  own 
lives  are  worthless. 

I  have  seen  the  whole  swarm,  when  it  was  sud- 
denly discovered  that  the  queen  was  missing,  show 
the  greatest  agitation,  every  individual  insect  rush- 
ing about  with  quivering  body  and  wings,  in  a  panic 
of  alarm.  What  one  bee  knew  and  felt,  apparently 
the  whole  swarm  knew  and  felt  simultaneously. 

It  is  worthy  of  note  that  though  it  costs  the  drone 
his  life  to  fertilize  the  queen,  dozens  of  them  course 
through  the  air  during  the  period  that  the  mating- 
flight  of  the  queen  is  due  to  take  place,  ready  to  sac- 
rifice themselves  in  performing  this  duty.  Alike 
with  drone,  worker,  queen,  the  paramount  instinct 
is  the  perpetuity  of  the  race. 

So  careless  of  the  male  of  most  species  is  Nature, 
so  solicitous  for  the  well-being  of  the  female!  The 
function  of  the  male  is  a  brief  one,  that  of  the  female 

74 


THE  MASTER  INSTINCT 

a  long  and  hazardous  one.  Among  birds  of  prej^  the 
female  is  the  larger,  the  bolder,  and  the  more  active. 
The  parental  instinct  seems  much  stronger  in  her 
than  in  the  male. 

The  breeding-instinct  has  developed  among  the 
birds,  especially  among  the  ground-builders,  one  of 
the  most  surprising  traits  or  practices  to  be  found  in 
all  animate  nature.  I  refer  to  the  tricks  and  the 
make-believe  that  birds  will  resort  to  in  order  to 
decoy  one  away  from  their  nests  or  their  young  — 
feigning  lameness,  paralysis,  suffocation,  anything 
to  fix  the  attention  of  the  intruder  upon  the  mother 
and  lure  him  away  from  her  precious  eggs  or  young. 
I  can  recall  nothing  else  so  extraordinary  in  the 
whole  range  of  animal  instinct.  The  bird  suddenly 
becomes  a  consummate  actor  and  plays  a  role  she 
probably  never  played  before,  and  plays  it  in  the 
best  style  of  the  art.  Her  behavior  looks  like  the 
outcome  of  a  sudden  process  of  reasoning.  "This 
creature,"  it  seems  to  say,  "wants  my  brood,  but  I 
will  make  him  want  me,  and  forget  the  brood.  To 
do  so,  I  have  only  to  throw  myself  in  his  way  and 
offer  him  an  easy  victim.  By  my  feigned  disable- 
ment I  can  draw  him  on  and  on,  while  my  young 
hide,  or  the  clue  to  my  nest  is  lost." 

Last  spring  in  a  low,  wooded  bottom  in  Georgia, 
my  friend  and  I  started  a  woodcock  from  her  nest, 
in  which  were  three  eggs.  The  bird  flew  a  few  yards, 
at  a  height  of  ten  feet  or  more,  and  then  suddenly 

75 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

doubled  up  and  fell  fluttering  to  the  ground,  pre- 
cisely as  if  she  had  been  shot.  It  was  a  surprising 
performance.  It  is  highly  probable  that  it  was  the 
first  time  she  ever  did  the  trick,  but  she  did  it  to  per- 
fection. Had  we  followed  her,  doubtless  she  would 
have  given  us  another  exhibition  of  her  art  of  make- 
believe. 

Strange  to  say,  after  all  her  concern  for  the  safety 
of  her  eggs,  the  bird  deserted  her  nest.  My  friend 
suggested  that  it  was  because  we  touched  one  of  her 
eggs;  but,  as  birds  have  little  or  no  powers  of  smell, 
this  reason  seems  inadequate.  Rather  am  I  inclined 
to  believe  that  some  accident  befell  the  bird. 

Equally  surprising  is  it  to  see  this  stupid-looking 
mud-prober  transformed  into  an  ecstatic  song-bird 
imder  the  influence  of  the  mating-instinct.  Whoever 
has  witnessed  its  hurried  spiral  flight  in  the  March 
and  April  twilights,  and  heard  its  curious  smacking, 
gurgling  notes  rain  down  out  of  the  obscurity  of  a 
couple  of  hundred  feet  of  air,  has  been  present  at  one 
of  the  surprising  incidents  in  the  life  of  this  bird. 

Love  not  only  makes  the  songless  woodcock  vocal; 
it  puts  a  new  song  into  the  throats  of  many  of  our 
birds.  The  oven-bird,  the  meadowlark,  the  purple 
finch,  the  goldfinch,  and  certain  of  the  sparrows  and 
warblers  are  keyed  up  to  the  point  where  the  flight- 
song,  or  song  of  ecstasy,  is  the  natural  expression  of 
the  bird  soul.  The  jays  and  crows  also  become 
musical,  and  the  woodpeckers  drum  in  varying  keys 

76 


THE  MASTER  INSTINCT 

on  the  resonant  limbs.  This  marked  contrast  be- 
tween their  ordinary  tones  and  their  love-songs 
reminds  one  of  Browning's  lines :  — 

"God  be  thanked,  the  meanest  of  his  creatures 
Boasts  two  soul-sides,  one  to  face  the  world  with. 
One  to  show  a  woman  when  he  loves  her!" 

In  the  vegetable  world  the  males  of  dioecious 
plants  perish  as  soon  as  the  period  of  bloom  of  the 
females,  or  pistillate  plants,  has  passed.  Our  spring 
plant  called  mouse-ear  and  everlasting  {Anten- 
naria)  is  a  familiar  example.  The  two  sexes  are  in 
separate  groups,  and  show  a  marked  difference  in 
their  appearance.  The  pistillate  plants  have  a  fem- 
inine look,  they  are  more  slender  and  graceful,  and 
show  more  color;  they  differ  in  looks  from  the  males 
as  much  as  the  queen  bees  differ  from  the  drones. 
The  males  are  short,  stubby,  freckled,  and  after  they 
have  shed  their  pollen  they  wither  and  perish, 
while  the  females  continue  to  develop  and  grow 
in  grace  and  beauty  till  their  seeds  are  matured. 
The  same  is  true  with  all  shrubs  and  trees  —  hazels, 
chestnuts,  oaks,  beeches  —  which  develop  their 
pollen  in  catkins  or  aments;  as  soon  as  the  pollen 
is  shed  upon  the  inconspicuous  flowers  the  catkins 
wither  and  fall. 

There  is  no  case  of  love  and  mating  among  the 
plants  more  pleasing  to  me  than  that  of  our  Indian 
corn.   When  I  see  the  male  blossom  push  its  panicle 

77 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

up  out  of  the  top  of  the  stalk,  bold,  rigid,  conspicu- 
ous, rustic-looking,  —  *' topping  out,"  as  the  farm- 
ers say,  —  and  then,  following  down  the  stalk  with 
my  eye,  see  among  the  leaves  the  female  blossom 
timidly  putting  out  her  delicate  silk  fringe,  like  a 
lock  of  greenish-golden  hair,  —  one  tender  thread  for 
each  kernel  of  corn  that  is  to  be,  —  and  awaiting  the 
caresses  through  the  agency  of  the  wind  of  her  suitor 
above,  I  am  witnessing  one  of  the  most  pleasing 
illustrations  of  Nature's  great  law  that  is  to  be  seen 
in  our  fields  and  gardens. 

In  the  case  of  no  other  tree  in  our  Northern  for- 
ests does  the  male  principle  assert  itself  so  conspicu- 
ously as  in  the  chestnut  —  a  tree  that  now,  alas! 
seems  in  danger  of  extinction  from  some  obscure 
fungus  disease  attacking  its  inner  bark.  In  early 
summer  its  masses  of  creamy- white  staminate  flow- 
ers make  the  top  of  the  woods  gay,  while  its  small, 
modest,  greenish  female  flowers  are  seen  only  by  him 
who  closely  searches  for  them.  But  the  gala  day  of 
the  males  is  brief,  while  the  obscure  mother-bloom 
goes  forward  and  develops  her  polished  triple  nuts 
of  autumn. 

The  odors  of  the  blooming  corn  and  blooming 
chestnut  in  some  way  suggest  fruition  and  the  sex 
passion. 

In  the  hazel,  masculine  and  feminine  contrast  in 
the  same  way  as  in  the  chestnut.  The  long,  showy, 
pollen-yielding  tassels  are  seen  from  afar,  but  the 

78 


THE  MASTER  INSTINCT 

minute  crimson  stars  of  the  nut-producing  flowers 
you  will  not  see  without  close  inspection.  Thus  do 
sex  characteristics  run  throughout  organic  nature. 
Whitman  speaks  of  the  sexuality  of  the  earth,  hav- 
ing in  mind,  no  doubt,  its  fertility  and  the  passive 
feminine  relation  it  sustains  to  the  orbs  above. 

Truly  the  breeding-instinct,  with  the  whole  train 
of  subsidiary  instincts  that  go  with  it,  is  close  to 
Nature's  heart,  closer  than  the  instinct  of  self- 
preservation.  Life  is  conserved  only  that  it  may 
produce  more  life.  In  the  insect  world,  certain  forms 
utterly  exhaust  themselves  in  the  art  of  reproduc- 
tion; others  in  the  act  of  providing  housing  and  food 
for  their  unborn  offspring.  The  May-fly  develops 
into  winged  liberty,  experiences  the  love-festival, 
deposits  its  eggs,  when  both  sexes  die,  all  within  the 
compass  of  a  few  hours.  Of  some  species  of  thread- 
worms it  is  said  that  "the  young  live  at  the  expense 
of  the  mother  till  she  is  reduced  to  a  mere  husk." 
Fabre  tells  us  of  a  species  of  dung-beetle  the  male  of 
which  scours  the  fields  for  food  for  the  young,  which 
he  carries  home  and,  with  his  trident,  reduces  to  a 
powder,  till,  after  the  labor  of  months,  without 
nourishment  himself,  he  becomes  utterly  exhausted 
and  dies. 

In  eating  up  her  lover  after  he  has  served  her  pur- 
pose, the  female  spider  seems  to  be  carrying  domes- 
tic economy  to  unwarranted  lengths.  Yet  genera- 
tion after  generation  of  male  spiders  court  the 

79 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

female,  though  often  with  obvious  signs  of  hesitancy 
and  trepidation.  Love  overcomes  the  lover's  fear 
of  the  ferocious  jaws  of  his  mistress.  The  same  is 
true  of  the  praying-mantis  and  the  scorpion,  as 
portrayed  by  the  inimitable  Fabre.  After  hours  or 
days  of  love  and  nuptial  bliss,  the  female  turns  and 
slays  her  lover,  and  makes  a  meal  off  him.  The 
human,  or,  rather,  inhuman,  Bluebeard  is  matched 
on  the  other  side  of  the  house.  Love  and  martyrdom 
go  hand  in  hand  with  honey-bees,  spiders,  and  scor- 
pions. Eating  up  your  mate  is  certainly  a  simple 
and  primitive  way  out  of  matrimonial  difficulties. 

Is  it  not  probable  that  in  all  such  cases  the  female 
obtains  some  nutritive  element,  maybe  in  minute 
quantities,  from  the  body  of  the  male  that  is  neces- 
sary for  the  complete  development  of  her  young? 
The  purpose  of  Nature  must  be  served  in  some  way 
in  such  a  tragedy,  as  it  is  when  certain  species  eat 
the  placenta  and  when  the  toad  devours  his  cast-off 
skin. 

Weismann  has  suggested  that  the  bodies  of  an- 
imals are  but  appendages  to  the  immortal  chain  of 
sex  cells  —  they  are  only  the  vessels  in  which  the 
precious  germs  are  nourished  and  conveyed,  the 
body  bearing  the  relation  to  them  of  host  to  para- 
site. 

So  solicitous  is  Nature  for  the  well-being  of  the 
offspring  that  she  will  rob  the  mother's  body,  if 
insufficiently  nourished,  to  feed  the  baby  she  is  car- 

80 


THE  MASTER  INSTINCT 

rying  in  her  womb.  If  the  laying  hen  is  not  properly 
suppKed  with  hme  material,  Nature  will  draw  it 
from  the  bones  of  the  hen  herself  to  build  the  shell 
of  the  egg.  The  offspring  is  first  always,  and  has  the 
right  of  way  over  all  else.  In  short,  the  struggle  to 
live  in  the  whole  organic  world  resolves  itself  into 
the  struggle  to  have  and  to  rear  offspring.    This  is 

*  the  one  divine  event 
Toward  which  the  whole  creation  moves.'' 


IV 

DAME  NATURE  AND  HER  CHILDREN 

WHEN  I  saw  a  chipmunk  going  by  my  door, 
busily  storing  up  his  winter  supphes  in  his 
den  in  the  bank  a  few  yards  below,  I  thought  how 
curious  it  is  that  these  wild  creatures,  thrown  en- 
tirely upon  their  own  resources  in  the  great  merci- 
less world  of  wild  nature,  with  no  one  to  care  for 
them  or  advise  them,  should  get  on  so  well,  and 
apparently  have  such  a  good  time  of  it.  I  was,  of 
course,  looking  at  the  subject  from  the  human  point 
of  view;  and  I  could  not  help  thinking  how  many 
appliances,  how  much  science,  how  much  coopera- 
tion, and  what  laws  and  government,  and  the  like 
we  all  require  in  order  to  live  out  our  lives  as  suc- 
cessfully as  the  wild  creatures  do. 

In  summer  and  winter,  in  storm  and  cold,  in  all 
seasons  and  in  all  places,  by  night  as  by  day,  with- 
out organization,  or  power  of  reason,  or  supervision, 
or  leaders,  or  defenders,  or  government,  or  schools, 
or  churches,  there  they  go,  well  and  happy,  equal 
to  all,  or  nearly  all,  emergencies,  and  making  fewer 
mistakes  than  we  human  beings  do.  Think  of  our 
elaborate  helps  and  conveniences ;  of  our  machinery 
for  taking  us  abroad,  or  for  preserving  us  at  home; 

82 


DAME  NATURE  AND  HER  CHILDREN 

of  our  laid-up  stores;  and  then  think  how  un- 
equipped are  the  wild  creatures  in  comparison. 

Look  at  the  snow  buntings  in  w^inter,  so  trium- 
phant over  storm  and  cold,  or  the  tiny  chickadees  in 
the  frozen  w^inter  woods.  They  know  where  to  look 
for  their  food,  what  to  do  by  day,  and  where  to  go  by 
night.  They  know  their  enemies;  they  know  where 
and  how  to  build  their  nests,  and  how  to  rear  their 
young;  they  know  all  they  have  to  know  in  order 
to  live  their  lives. 

When  I  see  a  chickadee  or  a  kinglet  come  to  the 
bit  of  suet  that  I  put  out  on  the  trunk  of  the  old 
maple  in  front  of  my  window  in  December,  I  say, 
"See  that  infant!  How  can  he  face  all  alone  the 
season  of  scarcity  and  cold.^^  '*  But  he  does  not  need 
coaching  from  me;  he  avails  himself  of  my  suet,  but 
he  would  get  on  without  it.  He  is  wise  in  his  own 
economies.  I  doubt  that  our  winter  birds  ever 
freeze  or  starve,  unless  in  extraordinary  circum- 
stances. 

When  I  see  a  band  of  robins  in  late  October  dis- 
porting in  my  vineyards,  filled  with  holiday  cheer 
and  hilarity,  calling,  singing,  squealing,  pursuing 
one  another  like  children  in  some  sort  of  game, 
apparently  not  at  all  disturbed  by  the  approach 
of  the  inclement  season  and  the  failure  of  their  food- 
supplies,  I  almost  envy  them  their  felicity.  They 
are  wise  without  reason,  happy  without  forethought, 
secure  without  rulers  or  safeguards  of  any  sort. 

83 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

When  a  Cooper's  hawk  makes  a  dash  among  them, 
their  mirth  turns  to  terror,  but  they  are  usually 
equal  to  the  emergency,  and  by  darting  through  the 
vines  they  manage  to  escape  him. 

It  is  said  that  when  a  flock  of  mallards,  or  of  black 
ducks,  while  feeding  upon  the  water,  see  an  eagle,  or 
a  certain  large  hawk  coming,  they  take  to  wing, 
knowing  that  they  can  outdistance  their  enemy,  but 
that  when  they  see  a  duck  hawk  coming,  they  hug 
the  water  the  closer,  knowing  well  that  their  safety 
is  not  in  flight,  but  in  diving  beneath  the  surface. 

What  ages  upon  ages  of  schooling  in  the  fierce 
struggle  for  existence  it  must  have  taken  the  wild 
creatures  to  get  their  wisdom  into  their  very  blood 
and  bones !  Yet  we  cannot  think  of  them  as  existing 
without  it;  we  cannot  go  back  in  thought  to  the  time 
when  they  did  not  have  it;  to  be  without  it  would  be 
to  cease  to  exist.  What,  then,  is  its  genesis.'^  We 
cannot  think  of  man  as  existing  without  his  reason, 
his  tools,  his  artificial  aids  of  one  kind  and  another; 
yet  there  was  a  time  when  he  did  exist  without  them, 
just  as  the  monkeys  and  anthropoid  apes  exist  with- 
out them.  Sufficient  for  the  day  is  the  wisdom  there- 
of. Every  stage  and  phase  of  animal  life  is  wise  in 
those  things  necessary  for  its  continuance,  but 
whether  that  wisdom  comes  from  experience  or  in- 
heritance, or  is  one  phase  of  the  wisdom  that  per- 
vades the  whole  economy  of  nature,  —  that  makes 
the  heart  beat  and  the  eye  see,  and  that  adapts 

84 


DAME  NATURE  AND  HER  CHILDREN 

every  organism  to  its  environment,  —  who  can 
tell? 

The  plants  are  all  wise  in  their  own  way;  they 
have  to  be,  or  cease  to  exist.  The  cultivated  ones 
cannot  shift  for  themselves  like  the  weeds  and  wild 
growths;  they  have  been  too  long  dependent  upon 
the  care  and  culture  of  man  for  that;  thrown  upon 
their  own  resources,  they  perish,  or  else  revert  to 
the  habits  of  their  wild  ancestors,  as  the  animals 
do. 

I  suppose  it  is  impossible  for  us  to  conceive  of  the 
discipline,  the  struggle,  the  schooling,  the  selection, 
that  all  species  of  animals  and  plants  have  gone 
through  in  the  course  of  biologic  time,  and  that  has 
given  them  the  hardiness,  the  hold  upon  life,  that 
they  now  possess.  The  strongest,  the  cleverest,  the 
fittest  have  always  had  the  best  chance  to  survive. 
Natural  competition  has  constantly  weeded  out  the 
feeble,  and  still  does  so;  but  it  does  not  do  it  so  tlior- 
oughly  among  men  as  among  mice,  because  mice 
have  no  medicine,  no  surgery,  no  hospitals,  no 
altruism. 

Different  species  of  animals  and  plants  differ 
greatly  in  their  power  to  get  on  in  the  world.  The 
ruffed  grouse,  for  example,  has  a  much  deeper  hold 
upon  life  than  his  cousin  the  quail,  mainly  because 
he  is  a  more  miscellaneous  feeder.  In  deep  snows 
the  quail  is  in  danger  of  perishing  for  want  of  food, 
but  the  grouse  takes  to  the  tree-tops  and  subsists 

85 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

upon  the  buds  of  the  birch,  the  apple,  and  other 
trees. 

The  flicker  will  thrive  where  other  woodpeckers 
would  starve,  because  he  is  a  ground-pecker  as 
well,  and  lives  upon  ants  and  other  ground  in- 
sects. 

In  the  struggle  for  existence  the  red  squirrel  is 
more  than  a  match  for  his  big  brother,  the  gray, 
because  he  is  more  energetic,  and  has  a  wider  range 
of  diet.  When  hard  put,  he  will  come  to  your  or- 
chard and  garden  and  chip  up  the  unripe  apples  and 
pears  for  the  immature  seeds  in  them;  he  will  cut 
out  the  germ  from  the  green  elm-flakes;  he  will  rob 
birds'  nests  of  eggs  and  of  young;  he  will  find  or  cut 
his  way  into  your  house  and  barn,  and  will  take  toll 
of  your  crops  in  a  way  that  the  gray  squirrel  will  not 
do;  on  the  other  hand,  his  lesser  brother  the  chip- 
munk will  survive  him,  because  he  regularly  lays 
up  winter  stores  in  his  den  in  the  ground,  and  is  snug 
and  warm  with  a  full  larder,  while  the  red  squirrel 
is  picking  up  a  precarious  subsistence  in  the  cold, 
snow-choked  woods.  The  bear  lasts  after  the  wolf 
is  gone,  because  he  is  a  miscellaneous  feeder,  and  is 
rarely  reduced  to  extremities.  For  the  same  reason 
the  hawk  starves  where  the  crow  thrives.  If  the 
crow  cannot  get  flesh,  he  will  put  up  with  fruit,  and 
grain,  and  nuts. 

The  flycatchers  among  our  birds  are  far  less  nu- 
merous than  the  fruit-  and  seed-eaters,  and  the  her- 

86 


DAME  NATURE  AND  HER  CHILDREN 

bivorous  and  graminivorous  mammals  greatly  exceed 
in  numbers  the  flesh-eaters;  they  can  get  their  food 
more  easily,  for  they  do  not  have  to  use  speed,  wit, 
strength,  or  prowess  in  order  to  obtain  it.  How  rare 
are  the  weasels,  compared  with  their  prey  of  rats 
and  mice  and  birds  and  squirrels  and  rabbits!  Yet 
the  weasels  have  goodly  families  each  season.  If 
man  had  not  been  a  miscellaneous  feeder,  could  he 
have  overspread  the  earth  as  he  has  done.?  If  an 
animal  can  eat  only  fish,  it  must  keep  near  the  water; 
if  it  can  eat  only  nuts,  it  must  keep  near  the  woods; 
if  it  subsists  upon  mosquitoes,  it  must  live  near  the 
marshes;  if  grass  is  its  only  diet,  its  range  is  limited 
to  certain  zones  and  certain  seasons. 

The  farmer  finds  it  much  more  difficult  to  check 
or  exterminate  certain  plants  or  weeds  than  others. 
The  common  milkweed  and  the  Canada  thistle  defy 
his  plough  because  the  parent  roots  are  beyond  its 
reach;  they  creep  horizontally  through  the  soil,  and 
send  up  their  shoots  at  short  intervals.  To  exter- 
minate the  plants,  you  must  remove  the  parent 
roots.  Looked  at  in  the  light  of  the  doctrine  of 
natural  selection,  it  would  seem  as  if  these  two 
plants  had  learned  through  experience  to  avoid  the 
plough  by  diving  deeper  into  the  soil  and  establish- 
ing permanent  parent  roots  there.  This  method  or 
habit  baffles  the  plough  completely.  What  other 
enemy  or  circumstance  could  have  so  driven  them 
into  the  ground?    In  a  region  un visited  by  the 

87 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

plough,  would  they  not  succeed  just  as  well  nearer 
the  surface,  or  with  only  a  tap-root  like  most  other 
plants?  This  habit  is  doubtless  much  older  than  the 
plough,  and  it  is  very  doubtful  if  the  explanation 
can  be  found  in  the  theory  of  natural  selection. 
Quack-grass  is  baffling  for  the  same  reason;  there  is 
a  family  root  that  travels  horizontally  under  the  soil 
and  sends  up  shoots  all  along  its  course;  dig  out  a 
yard  of  it,  and  yet  if  you  have  left  an  inch,  the  plant 
renews  itself.  The  chickweed  is  a  wonderfully  en- 
terprising plant.  It  is  one  of  the  very  first  to  start 
in  business  in  the  spring;  it  begins  to  bloom  in  March 
or  April;  it  matures  its  seeds  rapidly,  and  keeps  on 
blooming  and  seeding  nearly  all  summer,  so  that  it 
outwits  the  most  industrious  hoe  or  plough  that  I 
have  yet  seen.  Unless  you  catch  it  in  the  first  bloom- 
ing, it  gets  ahead  of  you. 

The  field  veronica  is  an  innocent  weed,  but  its 
ability  to  get  on  in  life  is  remarkable.  It  stole  into 
our  vineyards  like  a  thief  in  the  night;  where  it  came 
from  I  have  no  knowledge;  for  twenty  years  there 
was  no  vestige  of  it;  then  suddenly  it  appeared,  and 
rapidly  overspread  the  surface  of  the  ground.  It 
blooms  in  April,  and  by  the  time  the  plough  starts, 
a  sheet  of  delicate  blue  hovers  over  all  the  vineyard- 
slopes.  It  is  a  low  plant,  only  an  inch  or  two  high, 
and  the  plough  wipes  it  out  completely;  but  the  next 
spring  there  it  is  again,  thicker  than  ever,  painting 
the  ground  in  the  most  delicate  cerulean  tints;  it 

88 


DAME  NATURE  AND  HER  CHILDREN 

matures  some  of  its  seeds  each  spring  before  the 
plough  starts,  and  so  is  secure. 

Sooner  or  later  animals  and  plants  learn  to  play 
the  game  of  life  well;  if  they  fail  to  do  so,  they  ulti- 
mately become  extinct. 


OLD  FRIENDS  IN  NEW  PLACES 

LAST  winter  and  early  spring  in  central  Georgia 
I  had  great  pleasure  in  the  little  glimpses  of 
wild  life,  mostly  bird-life,  that  I  got  from  the  win- 
dows of  the  cabin  study  which  my  friend  built  for 
me  in  one  corner  of  an  old  unused  building  situated 
in  a  secluded  place  near  a  bushy  spring  run  and  a 
grove  of  pine-  and  oak-trees.  Many  of  our  more 
northern  birds  —  such  as  song  sparrows,  bluebirds, 
juncoes,  and  white-throats  —  winter  in  Georgia  and 
impart  a  sort  of  spring  air  to  the  more  secluded 
places  at  all  times.  The  mockingbird,  the  brown 
thrasher,  the  cardinal,  the  meadowlark,  the  crested 
titmouse,  the  Carolina  wren,  the  blue  jay,  the 
downy  woodpecker,  and  a  few  others  are  there  the 
year  round. 

February  in  Georgia  is  like  April  in  New  York  or 
New  England,  and  March  has  many  of  the  features 
of  early  May.  In  late  February  or  early  March  the 
red  maples  are  humming  with  honey-bees  and  the 
elms  are  beginning  to  unpack  their  floral  budgets. 

The  sparrows  —  white-throats  and  song  sparrows 
—  were  at  home  in  the  weedy  and  bashy  ground 
around  my  little  hermitage,  and  I  soon  encouraged 

90 


OLD  FRIENDS  IN  NEW  PLACES 

them  to  come  under  my  window  by  a  plentiful 
sprinkling  of  finely  cracked  corn  and  bird-seed. 
They  were  always  very  shy,  but  they  soon  learned 
to  associate  me  with  the  free  lunch,  so  that,  very 
soon  after  my  appearance,  —  about  nine  o'clock  in 
the  morning,  —  they  would  begin  to  gather  from  the 
near-by  coverts,  one  to  two  dozen  white-throats, 
with  four  or  five  song  sparrows,  and  now  and  then 
a  female  chewink.  The  chewinks  remain  there  the 
year  round,  but  the  song  sparrows  and  the  white- 
throats,  like  myself,  were  only  there  for  a  season. 

By  easy  stages  from  one  covert  to  another,  trav- 
eling mostly  at  night,  the  birds  were  soon  to  begin 
the  return  journey  northward.  I  think  the  same 
birds  lingered  with  me  day  after  day,  though  one 
cannot  be  sure  in  such  a  matter.  The  individual 
units  in  a  stream  of  slowly  passing  birds  of  the  same 
species  do  not  differ  from  one  another  in  appear- 
ance any  more  than  do  the  separate  ripples  in  a 
stream  of  flowing  water.  Outside  of  man's  influ- 
ence, the  individuals  of  a  species  of  wild  creatures 
or  wild  flowers  do  not  seem  to  differ  from  one  an- 
other by  as  much  as  one  hair  or  one  feather  or  one 
petal.  They  are  like  coin  stamped  with  the  same  die, 
and  the  wonder  of  it  is  that  each  and  all,  among  the 
birds,  at  least,  seem  like  new  coin  —  not  one  blurred 
or  imperfect  impression.  This  fact  alwaj^s  strikes 
one  in  gazing  upon  a  flock  of  wild  birds  of  any  kind 
in  the  fall  or  in  the  spring.  The  wear  and  tear  of  life 

91 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

seems  to  leave  no  mark  upon  them.  Take  a  hundred 
snow  buntings  in  winter,  or  robins  or  bluebirds  in 
the  spring,  and  each  individual  seems  up  to  the 
standard  of  its  kind.  Indeed,  Nature  has  standard- 
ized them  all. 

Among  the  song  sparrows  and  white-throats  that 
gathered  for  their  daily  lunch  under  my  window,  I 
noted  differences  between  male  and  female  and  be- 
tween old  and  young,  yet  each  individual  seemed  at 
the  top  of  its  condition.  How  free  from  spot  or  blem- 
ish they  were,  not  one  disheveled  or  unkempt,  not 
one  vagabond  or  unfortunate  among  them.  How 
neatly  groomed  they  were,  every  feather  perfect  and 
every  feather  in  its  place.  How  bright  and  distinct 
the  pencilings  of  the  song  sparrows'  backs!  The 
surplices  of  the  white-throats  had  just  come  from 
the  laundry.  Among  all  the  wild  creatures  it  is  the 
same.  Nature  deals  evenly  and  impartially  with 
them.  They  differ  markedly  in  this  respect  from 
birds  and  mammals  under  domestication.  A  brood 
of  newly  hatched  chickens  are  fresh  and  clean 
enough,  but  they  very  soon  deteriorate  in  appear- 
ance; but  a  brood  of  young  grouse  or  quail  keep  as 
clean  and  bright  as  shells  upon  the  beach.  Then 
consider  the  chipmunks  and  red  squirrels  —  how 
rarely  is  one  of  them  below  the  standard  of  its  kind! 
how  rarely  one  shows  any  indication  of  hard  luck, 
or  a  loss  of  standing  among  his  fellows !  None  are 
poor;  all  are  equally  prosperous.   Success  is  wTitten 

92 


OLD  FRIENDS  IN  NEW  PLACES 

on  every  one  of  them.  Rarely  is  a  single  hair  out  of 
place. 

How  wise  the  white-throats  are  about  cracked 
corn,  taking  nothing  above  a  certain  size!  They 
pick  up  the  larger  pieces  and  test  them  with  their 
beaks  and  drop  them,  then  pick  them  up  and  feel 
them  again  to  be  quite  sure  they  have  made  no  mis- 
take. Their  little  gizzards  cannot  grind  the  flinty 
corn  except  when  taken  in  very  small  bits.  The 
fruit-  and  insect-eating  birds  that  sometimes  come 
about  your  door  in  winter  or  spring  with  the  white- 
throats  will  examine  the  seeds  and  bits  of  corn,  but 
will  not  eat  them.  One  February  a  flock  of  white- 
throats  and  juncoes  came  daily  to  the  dooryard  of  a 
friend  of  mine  near  New  York  City.  She  sprinkled 
the  ground  with  rolled  oats  and  hominy  grits  and 
her  visitors  made  the  most  of  her  bounty.  One 
morning  there  was  a  newcomer  —  a  thrush  evi- 
dently hard  put  for  food.  He  hopped  about  amid  the 
feeding  sparrows  with  drooping  wings,  picking  up 
the  seeds  and  grains  and  dropping  them  again,  ap- 
parently wondering  what  the  others  found  that  was 
so  appetizing.  The  bird  was  in  desperate  straits;  he 
ate  the  snow,  but  I  fancy  it  only  aggravated  his 
hunger. 

The  newcomer  turned  out  to  be  a  hermit  thrush. 
I  told  my  friend  to  take  any  dried  fruit  she  happened 
to  have  —  raisins,  dried  currants,  dried  cherries,  or 
dried  berries,  and  cut  them  up  and  sprinkle  them 

93 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

among  the  seeds.  She  did  so,  and  it  was  not  long 
before  the  thrush  began  to  examine  them  and  taste 
them  doubtingly,  but  very  soon  he  was  eating  them. 
That  afternoon  his  drooping  wings  were  getting 
back  to  their  normal  place,  and  in  a  day  or  two  he 
was  a  changed  bird,  brisk  and  bold,  domineering 
over  the  other  birds,  —  in  a  very  courteous  way, 
however,  —  and  very  much  set  up  in  life. 

A  bird  never  appears  emaciated;  it  will  starve  and 
retain  its  plump  appearance.  Robins  will  famish 
amid  a  world  of  seeds  and  grains.  They  must  have 
fruit  or  worms.  Three  years  ago,  while  spending  the 
winter  in  Georgia,  I  had  evidence  that  a  vast  num- 
ber of  robins  starved  to  death  in  March.  People 
picked  them  up  in  their  yards  and  in  the  fields  and 
along  the  edge  of  the  woods.  They  seem  to  have 
started  north  from  Florida  and  the  Gulf  States  too 
soon.  A  sudden  cold  snap  kept  the  worms  and  in- 
sects below  the  surface  of  the  ground,  and  there  was 
no  fruit  but  the  white,  dry  china-berries,  and  these 
appear  to  poison  or  to  paralyze  the  robins  when  they 
eat  them.  In  my  walk  one  morning  I  picked  up  a 
cock  robin  that  was  unable  to  fly.  As  it  did  not 
appear  to  have  been  injured  in  any  way,  and  was 
of  very  light  weight,  I  concluded  it  was  starving. 
I  took  it  into  the  house  and  let  it  perch  on  the  back 
of  a  chair  in  the  study.  It  showed  little  signs  of  fear 
and  made  no  effort  to  escape.  I  dug  a  handful  of 
earthworms,  and  dangled  one  of  them  before  its 

94 


OLD  FRIENDS  IN  NEW  PLACES 

beak.  After  eyeing  it  a  moment  it  opened  its  beak 
and  I  dropped  the  worm  into  its  mouth.  Others 
soon  followed,  and  still  others.  The  bird  began  to 
wake  up  and  come  to  itself.  In  a  little  while  it  was 
taking  the  food  eagerly  and  without  any  signs  of 
fear.  I  could  stroke  it  with  one  hand  while  I  fed  it 
with  the  other.  It  would  sit  on  my  knee  or  arm  and 
take  the  food  that  was  offered  it.  I  was  kept  pretty 
busy  supplying  its  wants  till  in  the  afternoon  it  be- 
gan to  fly  and  to  run  about  the  room  and  utter  its 
call-note.  Before  night  it  had  become  so  active  and 
so  clamorous  for  its  freedom  that  we  opened  the 
window.  With  a  dash  and  a  cry  it  was  out  of  the 
house  and  on  the  w^ing  to  a  near-by  tree.  I  trust, 
with  the  boost  I  had  given  it,  it  was  soon  safely  on 
its  northward  journey. 

The  incident  shows  how  extreme  hunger  in  a  wild 
creature  banishes  fear.  One  March  day,  when  I  was 
a  boy,  I  found  a  raccoon  wandering  about  the 
meadow  so  famished  that  he  allowed  me  to  pick  him 
up  by  the  tail  and  carry  him  to  the  house.  He  ate 
ravenously  the  food  I  offered  him. 

The  struggle  for  hfe  among  the  birds  and  other 
wild  creatures  is  so  severe  that  the  feeble  and  mal- 
formed, or  the  handicapped  in  any  way,  quickly  drop 
out.  Probably  none  of  them  ever  die  from  old  age. 
They  are  cut  off  in  their  prime.  A  weeding-out 
process  goes  on  from  the  time  they  leave  the  nest. 
A  full  measure  of  life,  the  perfection  of  every  quill 

95 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

and  feather,  and  unerring  instinct  carry  them 
along.  They  are  always  in  the  enemy's  country; 
they  are  always  on  the  firing-line;  eternal  vigilance 
and  ceaseless  activity  are  the  price  of  life  with  them. 
The  natural  length  of  life  of  our  smaller  birds  is 
probably  eight  or  ten  years,  but  I  doubt  if  one  in 
a  thousand  reaches  that  age.  Not  half  a  dozen 
times  in  my  life  have  I  found  the  body  of  a  dead 
bird  that  did  not  show  some  marks  of  violence. 

Next  to  the  trim,  prosperous,  well-dressed  ap- 
pearance of  a  flock  of  wild  birds,  one  is  struck  with 
their  caution  and  watchfulness,  not  to  say  nervous- 
ness, at  all  times,  especially  when  feeding  in  the 
open.  My  band  of  sparrows  were  apprehensive  of 
danger  every  moment.  Here  are  some  notes  made 
on  the  spot:  — 

Now  there  are  over  two  dozen  sparrows,  among  them 
a  solitary  female  chewink,  feeding  on  the  ground  in  front 
of  my  window.  An  ever-present  fear  possesses  every  one 
of  them.  They  pick  up  the  seeds  hurriedly,  looking  up 
every  few  seconds.  Suddenly  they  all  stop,  and,  crouch- 
ing, look  toward  the  near-by  weeds  and  bushes.  Some 
vague  alarm  has  seized  them.  Then  two  of  them  dart 
away;  then  the  w^hole  flock  rushes  to  cover.  I  see  no  cause 
for  the  panic;  there  is  none;  the  strain  has  become  too 
great  to  be  longer  borne.  Though  no  danger  is  near,  yet 
their  instinct,  developed  and  sharpened  by  the  experi- 
ences of  untold  generations,  tells  them  danger  might  be 
near  —  a  hawk,  a  cat,  or  other  enemy  —  and  that  safety 
demands  a  frequent  rush  to  cover.  After  a  few  minutes 
they  return,  one  by  one,  flying  from  weed-stalk  to  weed- 

96 


OLD  FRIENDS  IN  NEW  PLACES 

stalk,  and  dropping  upon  the  ground  where  the  seed  is 
scattered,  with  many  a  suspicious  flip  of  wing  and  flirt  of 
tail.  A  dozen  or  more  are  soon  hurriedly  feeding  again, 
now  and  then  running  spitefully  at  one  another,  as  if  the 
aggressors  felt  a  prior  claim,  but  not  actually  coming  to 
blows. 

When  the  dry  grass  and  weeds  cover  the  seed  a  song 
sparrow  may  be  seen  now  and  then  executing  a  quick 
movement  upon  it  with  both  feet,  a  short  double  jump 
forwards  and  backwards.  This  is  the  way  the  sparrow 
scratches  —  a  crude  and  awkward  way,  certainly.  She 
has  not  yet  learned  to  stand  alternately  upon  one  foot  and 
scratch  with  the  other,  as  do  the  hen  and  all  other  true 
scratchers,  and  she  probably  never  will.  The  sparrows, 
and  many  other  birds,  move  the  two  feet  together.  They 
are  hoppers,  and  not  walkers  or  runners.  Such  birds  make 
a  poor  show  of  scratching.  The  chewink  scratches  in  the 
same  way,  but  being  a  much  larger  bird,  she  rakes  or  kicks 
obtruding  weeds  about  quite  successfully. 

In  less  than  two  minutes  the  birds  again  take  the  alarm 
and  dart  away  to  their  weedy  refuge. 

This  is  the  habit  of  all  birds  that  feed  in  numbers 
in  this  way  in  open  places.  Snow  buntings,  juncoes, 
sparrows,  reed-birds,  blackbirds  —  all  are  haunted 
by  a  vague  sense  of  impending  danger  when  they  are 
feeding,  and  are  given  to  sudden  flights  to  cover, 
or  to  circling  in  the  air. 

I  remember  that  the  flocks  of  passenger  pigeons 
that  I  used  to  see  in  my  youth  would  burst  uj)  from 
the  ground  when  they  were  feeding,  at  short  inter- 
vals, in  the  same  sudden,  alarmed  way.  It  is  easy 
to  see  how  the  fear  of  all  ground-feeders  has  become 

97 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

so  developed  and  fixed.  Hawks  are  doubtless  the 
main  cause  of  it.  The  hawk  comes  suddenly  and 
strikes  quickly,  and  is  doubtless  as  old  an  enemy  as 
the  birds  have.  For  ages  he  had  been  wont  to  swoop 
down  from  the  air  or  from  the  cover  of  a  tree,  or  has 
skimmed  over  the  hill  and  in  a  twinkling  snatched 
a  feeding  bird.  I  have  seen  the  sharp-shinned  hawk 
in  winter  sweep  over  a  garden  fence  and  snatch  an 
English  sparrow  from  a  flock  feeding  in  the  street. 
I  have  seen  one  of  the  smaller  hawks  pick  up  a 
high-hole  feeding  in  the  fields  in  the  same  v/ay. 
Birds  feeding  singly  are  less  easily  alarmed  than 
when  feeding  in  flocks,  just  as  you  and  I  would  be. 
Fear  is  contagious,  and  a  bird  feeding  alone  has  no 
alarms  or  suspicions  but  its  own  to  disturb  it. 

Since  these  birds  left  Canada  and  northern  New 
England  last  October  they  have  probably  traveled 
over  two  thousand  miles,  beset  by  their  natural  en- 
emies at  all  times  and  places  —  in  fields  and  marshes 
and  woods ;  in  danger  of  hawks  and  shrikes  and  cats 
by  day,  and  of  owls  and  other  prowlers  by  night;  com- 
pelled to  hustle  for  food  at  all  times,  and  to  expose 
themselves  to  a  thousand  dangers.  Is  it  any  wonder 
that  they  are  nervous  and  watchful .^^ 

In  returning  they  will  be  exposed  to  the  same 
dangers.  Their  traveling  is  mostly  done  by  night 
and  it  is  probably  by  easy  stages.  But  just  how  long 
any  single  flight  is  we  have  no  accurate  means  of 
knowing.  It  would  be  interesting  to  know  if  the  song 

98 


OLD  FRIENDS  IN  NEW  PLACES 

sparrows  and  juncoes  traveled  in  company  with  the 
white-throats,  as  they  are  usually  found  together 
by  day.  If  they  do,  the  song  sparrows  would  })egiQ 
to  drop  out  of  the  procession  by  the  time  they 
reached  the  Potomac,  and  continue  dropping  out 
more  and  more  all  through  New  York  and  New  Eng- 
land, but  some  of  them  keeping  on  well  into  Canada. 
The  juncoes  would  begin  to  drop  out  in  the  Catskills, 
where  they  breed,  and  a  few  white-throats  may  do 
so  likewise,  as  I  have  found  them  in  midsummer  in 
some  of  the  higher  regions  of  these  mountains. 

Fear  and  suspicion  are  almost  constant  compan- 
ions of  most  of  the  wild  creatures.  Even  the  crow, 
who  has  no  natural  enemies  that  I  know  of,  is  the 
very  embodiment  of  caution  and  cunning.  That 
peculiar  wing-gesture  when  he  alights  or  walks  about 
the  fields  —  how  expressive  it  is !  It  is  a  little  flash 
or  twinkle  of  black  plumes  that  tells  you  how  alert 
and  on  his  guard  he  is.  It  is  a  difficult  problem  to 
settle  why  the  crow  is  so  suspicious  and  cunning, 
since  he  has  few  or  no  natural  enemies.  No  creature 
seems  to  want  his  flesh,  tough  and  unsavory  as  it 
evidently  is,  and  we  can  hardly  attribute  it  to  his 
contact  with  man,  as  we  can  the  wildness  of  the 
hawk,  because,  on  the  whole,  mankind  is  rather 
friendly  to  the  crow.  His  suspicion  seems  ingrained, 
and  probably  involves  some  factor  or  factors  in  his 
biological  history  that  we  are  ignorant  of. 

On  the  whole,  it  is  only  the  birds  and  animals 

99 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

whicli  are  preyed  upon  that  show  excessive  caution 
and  fear.  One  can  well  understand  how  the  constant 
danger  of  being  eaten  does  not  contribute  to  the 
ease  and  composure  of  any  creature,  and  why  these 
which  are  so  beset  are  in  a  state  of  what  we  call  ner- 
vousness most  of  the  time.  Behold  the  small  ro- 
dents —  rats,  mice,  squirrels,  rabbits,  woodchucks, 
and  the  like;  they  act  as  if  they  felt  the  eyes  of  the 
mink  or  the  weasel  or  the  cat  or  the  hawk  upon 
them  all  the  time. 

Among  the  birds  some  are  much  more  nervous 
and  "panicky"  than  others.  The  woodpeckers  are 
less  so  than  the  thrushes  and  finches;  the  jays  less 
than  the  starlings  and  the  game-birds.  The  seed- 
eaters  and  fruit-eaters  are  probably  preyed  upon 
much  more  than  the  purely  insectivorous  birds, 
because  doubtless  their  flesh  is  sweeter. 

Birds  of  prey  have  few  enemies  apart  from  man. 
Among  the  land  animals  we  ourselves  prefer  the 
flesh  of  the  vegetable-eaters,  and  the  carnivora  do 
the  same.  We  aU  want  to  get  as  near  to  the  vege- 
table as  we  can,  even  in  our  meat-eating. 

The  birds,  even  the  prettiest  of  them,  are  little 
savages.  In  watching  from  my  window  the  feeding 
white-throats  and  song  sparrows,  I  cannot  help  no- 
ticing how  ungenerously  they  behave  toward  one 
another  —  apparently  not  one  of  them  willing  to 
share  the  feast  with  another.  Each  seems  to  think 
the  food  his  or  her  special  discovery  and  that  the 

100 


OLD  FRIENDS  IN  NEW  PLACES 

others  are  trespassers.  They  charge  spitefully  upon 
one  another,  but  rarely  come  to  blows.  Just  what 
makes  one  give  way  so  readily  before  another,  with- 
out any  test  of  strength,  is  a  puzzle.  Is  the  author- 
ity in  the  eye,  in  the  bearing,  or  is  it  just  a  matter  of 
audacity  and  self-assertion.'^  There  may  be  timid 
and  retiring  souls  among  the  birds  as  well  as  among 
other  folk.  I  am  inclined  to  think  that  usually  it  is 
the  males  bullying  the  females.  Occasionally  two 
males,  known  by  their  more  conspicuous  markings, 
confront  each  other  and  rise  in  the  air  a  yard  or 
two,  beak  to  beak,  and  then  separate. 

During  the  mating  season  there  is  mutual  aid  and 
cooperation  between  the  sexes,  the  male  bird  often 
feeding  the  female.  But  at  other  times  there  is  lit- 
tle friendliness,  certainly  no  gallantry.  The  downy 
woodpecker  in  w  inter  will  drive  the  female  spitefully 
away  from  the  bone  or  the  suet  on  the  tree  in  front 
of  my  window  till  he  is  first  served.  I  have  never 
seen  crows  quarrel  or  strive  with  one  another  over 
their  food.  On  the  contrary,  if  the  crow  discovers 
food  in  winter,  he  seems  glad  to  be  joined  by  a  com- 
panion or  several  of  them.  The  crow  is  a  generous 
bird;  he  has  the  true  social  instinct.  He  will  watch 
while  his  fellow  feeds;  he  cheerfully  shares  his  last 
morsel  with  a  comrade.  How  different  from  any  of 
the  hawk  tribe !  A  farm-boy  living  near  me  brought 
up  four  young  sparrow  hawks  in  a  cage.  They  w^ere 
as  jealous  of  one  another  over  their  food  as  cats  are, 

101 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

and  when  they  were  nearly  full-grown,  and  the  food 
was  insuflacient,  they  proceeded  to  devour  one  an- 
other. I  kept  two  of  the  survivors  a  few  days,  but 
they  were  so  utterly  cruel  and  savage  that  I  was 
glad  to  let  them  escape. 

Most  of  our  rodents  are  as  free  from  guile  as  our 
birds;  they  have  none  of  the  subtlety  and  cunning 
of  their  enemies  the  fox  and  the  wolf;  they  are 
simply  wild  and  shy.  The  rabbit  has  little  wit,  yet 
she  manages  to  run  the  gantlet  of  her  numerous 
enemies.  Some  of  her  arts  of  concealment  are  as  old 
as  mankind  —  the  art  of  hiding  where  no  one  would 
think  of  looking  —  concealment  where  there  is  little 
to  conceal  her.  One  March  day  I  started  a  rabbit 
from  her  form  in  a  broad,  open  cultivated  field.  She 
had  excavated  a  little  place  in  the  soft  ground  just 
deep  enough  to  admit  the  hind  part  of  her  body  and 
there  she  crouched  in  the  open  sunlight  with  only  a 
little  dry  grass  partly  screening  her.  When  I  was 
within  two  paces  of  her  she  bounded  away  like  the 
wind  and  directed  her  course  toward  a  bushy  ravine 
several  hundred  yards  away.  The  advantage  of  her 
position  was  that  she  commanded  all  approaches; 
nothing  could  steal  a  march  upon  her,  and  she 
could  flee  in  any  direction.  In  a  tangle  of  weeds  or 
bushes  she  would  have  been  where  every  one  of  her 
natural  enemies  prowl  or  beat  about,  and  where 
concealment  would  have  been  more  or  less  confine- 
ment.  A  few  yards  farther  along  I  came  upon  an- 

102 


OLD  FRIENDS  IN  NEW  PLACES 

other  vacant  form  —  the  perfection  of  art  witliout 
any  art.  When  the  rabbit  builds  her  nest  and  has 
her  young  she  does  not  seek  out  a  dense  cover,  but 
comes  right  out  into  the  clear  open  spaces  where  you 
would  never  think  of  looking.  She  excavates  a  little 
cradle  in  the  ground,  gathers  some  dry  grass,  weaves 
a  little  blanket  of  dry  grass  and  fur  from  her  own 
body,  just  large  enough  to  cover  it,  and  her  secret 
is  well  kept  —  most  hidden  when  hidden  the  least. 
Quail  and  grouse  know  something  of  the  same  art, 
and  never  make  their  nests  in  a  thick  tangle.  I 
have  seen  a  quail's  nest  with  twenty  eggs  in  it  on 
the  edge  of  a  public  highway.  The  brooding  bird 
allowed  me  almost  to  touch  her  with  my  hand  be- 
fore she  flew  away. 

If  every  bushy  and  weedy  spring  run  in  Georgia 
embracing  not  more  than  an  acre  or  two  of  ground 
has  two  dozen  sparrows,  to  say  nothing  of  a  pair  or 
two  of  cardinals,  Carolina  wrens,  and  mockingbirds, 
one  can  get  some  idea  of  what  a  vast  number  of  birds 
such  a  large  State  —  over  three  hundred  miles  long 
and  two  hundred  miles  wide  —  holds.  With  two 
pairs  of  birds  to  the  acre,  a  fair  estimate,  it  would 
count  up  to  over  seventy  millions.  The  farm  of 
about  one  hundred  and  thirty  acres  upon  which  I 
passed  February  and  March  probably  held  several 
dozen  sparrows  and  as  many  juncoes,  a  score  or  two 
blue  jays,  and  two  or  three  dozen  meadowlarks,  a 
pair  each  of  cardinals,  Carolina  wrens,  and  browD 

103 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

thrashers,  besides  other  birds.  In  one  ploughed  field 
I  saw,  day  after  day,  ten  or  fifteen  killdee  plovers. 
Their  wild  cries,  their  silver  sides  glancing  in  the 
sun,  and  their  long  powerful  wings  were  always  a 
welcome  sight  and  sound. 

Probably  more  kinds  of  birds  feed  on  insects  than 
upon  seeds  and  fruits,  though  the  seed-  and  fruit- 
eaters  are  the  more  numerous,  and  abide  with  us 
more  months  in  the  year.  It  is  true  also  that  the 
seed-eaters  nearly  all  eat  insects  at  times,  and  start 
their  young  in  life  upon  insect  food.  One  can  easily 
see,  then,  what  an  inevitable  part  the  birds  play  in 
keeping  down  the  insect  pests  that  might  otherwise 
overwhelm  us. 


VI 

THE  STILL  SMALL  VOICE 

ONE  summer  day,  while  I  was  walking  along  the 
comitry  road  on  the  farm  where  I  was  born,  a 
section  of  the  stone  wall  opposite  me,  and  not  more 
than  three  or  fom*  yards  distant,  suddenly  fell  down. 
Amid  the  general  stillness  and  immobility  about  me, 
the  effect  was  quite  startling.  The  question  at  once 
arose  in  my  mind  as  to  just  what  happened  to  that 
bit  of  stone  wall  at  that  particular  moment  to  cause 
it  to  fall.  Maybe  the  slight  vibration  imparted  to 
the  ground  by  my  tread  caused  the  minute  shifting 
of  forces  that  brought  it  down.  But  the  time  was 
ripe;  a  long,  slow,  silent  process  of  decay  and  disin- 
tegration, or  a  shifting  of  the  points  of  bearing  amid 
the  fragments  of  stone  by  the  action  of  the  weather, 
culminated  at  that  instant,  and  the  wall  fell.  It  was 
the  sudden  summing-up  of  half  a  century  or  more 
of  atomic  changes  in  the  material  of  the  wall.  A 
grain  or  two  of  sand  yielded  to  the  pressure  of  long 
years,  and  gravity  did  the  rest.  It  was  as  when  the 
keystone  of  an  arch  crumbles  or  weakens  to  the  last 
particle,  and  the  arch  suddenly  collai)ses. 

The  same  thing  happened  in  the  case  of  the  large 
spruce-tree  that  fell  as  our  steamer  passed  near  the 

105 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

shore  in  Alaskan  waters,  or  when  the  campers  in  the 
forest  heard  a  tree  fall  in  the  stillness  of  the  night. 
In  both  cases  the  tree's  hour  had  come;  the  balance 
of  forces  was  suddenly  broken  by  the  yielding  of 
some  small  particle  in  the  woody  tissues  of  the  tree, 
and  down  it  came.  In  all  such  cases  there  must  be 
a  moment  of  time  when  the  upholding  and  down- 
pulling  forces  are  just  balanced;  then  the  yielding 
of  one  grain  more  gives  the  victory  to  gravity.  The 
slow  minute  changes  in  the  tree,  and  in  the  stone 
wall,  that  precede  their  downfall,  we  do  not  see  or 
hear;  the  sudden  culmination  and  collapse  alone 
arrest  our  attention.  An  earthquake  is  doubtless 
the  result  of  the  sudden  release  of  forces  that  have 
been  in  stress  and  strain  for  years  or  ages;  some 
point  at  last  gives  way,  and  the  earth  trembles  or 
the  mountains  fall. 

It  is  the  slow  insensible  changes  in  the  equipoise 
of  the  elements  about  us  that,  in  the  course  of  long 
periods  of  time,  put  a  new  face  upon  the  aspect 
of  the  earth.  Rapid  and  noisy  changes  over  large 
areas,  which  may  have  occurred  during  the  geologic 
ages,  we  do  not  now  see  except  in  the  case  of  an 
earthquake.  It  is  the  ceaseless  activity,  both  chem- 
ical and  physical,  in  the  bodies  about  us,  of  which 
we  take  no  note,  that  transforms  the  world.  Atom  by 
atom  the  face  of  the  immobile  rocks  changes.  The 
terrible  demonstrative  forces,  such  as  electric  dis- 
charges during  a  storm,  which  seem  competent  to 

106 


THE  STILL  SMALL  VOICE 

level  mountains  or  blot  out  landscapes,  usually 
make  but  slight  impression  upon  the  fields  and  hills. 
In  the  ordinary  course  of  nature,  the  great  benef- 
icent changes  come  slowly  and  silently.  The  noisy 
changes,  for  the  most  part,  mean  violence  and  dis- 
ruption. The  roar  of  storms  and  tornadoes,  the  ex- 
plosions of  volcanoes,  the  crash  of  the  thunder,  are 
the  result  of  a  sudden  break  in  the  equipoise  of  the 
elements;  from  a  condition  of  comparative  repose 
and  silence  they  become  fearfully  swift  and  audible. 
The  still  small  voice  is  the  voice  of  life  and  growth 
and  perpetuity.  In  the  stillness  of  a  bright  summer 
day  w^hat  work  is  being  accomplished!  what  proc- 
esses are  being  consummated!  When  the  tornado 
comes,  how  quickly  much  of  it  may  be  brought  to 
naught!  In  the  history  of  a  nation  it  is  the  same. 
The  terrible  war  that  is  now  devastating  Europe  is 
the  tornado  that  comes  in  the  peace  and  fruitful  re- 
pK)se  of  a  summer's  day.  As  living  nature  in  time  re- 
covers from  the  destructive  effects  of  the  mad  war- 
ring of  the  inorganic  elements,  so  the  nations  will 
eventually  recover  from  the  blight  and  waste  of  this 
war.  But  the  gains  and  the  benefits  can  never  offset 
the  losses  and  the  agony.  The  discipline  and  agony 
of  war  only  fit  a  people  for  more  war.  If  war  is  to  be 
the  business  of  mankind,  then  the  more  of  it  we  have 
the  better;  if  there  is  no  true  growth  or  expansion 
for  a  people,  save  through  blood  and  fire,  then  let 
the  blood  and  fire  come  to  all  of  us,  the  more  the 

107 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

better.  The  German  gospel  of  war,  so  assiduously 
preached  and  so  heroically  practiced  in  our  day,  is 
based  upon  the  conviction  that  there  is  no  true 
growth  for  a  nation  except  by  the  sword,  that  the 
still  small  voice  of  love  and  good  will  must  give 
place  to  the  brazen  trumpet  that  sounds  the  onset 
of  hostile  and  destroying  legions. 

Are  the  arts  of  peace  seductive,  and  do  they  hasten 
the  mortal  ripening  of  a  people's  character?  Must 
the  ploughshares  now  be  forged  into  swords  and  the 
swords  used  to  spill  our  neighbors'  blood?  The 
current  gospel  of  war  is  the  gospel  of  hate  and  re- 
prisal, of  broken  treaties  and  burned  cities,  of  mur- 
dered women  and  children,  and  devastated  homes. 

What  a  noise  politics  makes  in  the  world,  our  poli- 
tics especially !  But  some  silent  thinker  in  his  study, 
or  some  inventor  in  his  laboratory,  is  starting  cur- 
rents that  will  make  or  unmake  politics  for  genera- 
tions to  come.  How  noiseless  is  the  light,  yet  what 
power  dwells  in  the  sunbeams  —  mechanical  power 
at  one  end  of  the  spectrum,  in  the  red  and  infra-red 
rays,  and  chemical  power  at  the  other  or  violet  and 
ultra-violet  end !  It  is  the  mechanical  forces  — 
the  winds,  the  rains,  the  movements  of  ponderable 
bodies  —  that  fill  the  world  with  noise;  the  chemi- 
cal changes  that  disintegrate  the  rocks  and  set  the 
currents  of  life  going  are  silent.  The  great  loom  in 
which  is  woven  all  the  living  textures  that  clothe  the 
world  with  verdure  and  people  it  with  animated 

108 


THE  STILL  SMALL  VOICE 

forms  makes  no  sound.  Think  of  the  still  small 
voice  of  radio-activity  —  so  still  and  small  that  only 
molecular  science  is  aware  of  it,  yet  physicists  be- 
lieve it  to  be  the  mainspring  of  the  universe. 

The  vast  ice-engine  that  we  call  a  glacier  is  almost 
as  silent  as  the  slumbering  rocks,  and,  to  all  but  the 
eye  of  science,  nearly  as  immobile,  save  where  it 
discharges  into  the  sea.  It  is  noisy  in  its  dying,  but 
in  the  height  of  its  powder  it  is  as  still  as  the  falling 
snow  of  which  it  is  made.  Yet  give  it  time  enough, 
and  it  scoops  out  the  valleys  and  grinds  down  the 
mountains  and  turns  the  courses  of  rivers,  or  makes 
new  ones. 

We  split  the  rocks  and  level  the  hills  with  our 
powder  and  dynamite  and  fill  the  world  with  noise; 
but  behold  the  vast  cleavage  of  the  rocks  which  the 
slow,  noiseless  forces  of  sun  and  frost  bring  about! 
In  the  Shawangunk  Mountains  one  may  see  enor- 
mous masses  of  conglomerate  that  have  been  split 
down  from  the  main  range,  showing  as  clean  a 
cleavage  over  vast  surfaces  as  the  quarryman  can 
produce  on  small  blocks  with  his  drills  and  wedges. 
One  has  to  pause  and  speculate  on  the  character 
of  the  forces  that  achieved  such  results  and  left  no 
mark  of  sudden  violence  behind.  The  forces  that 
cleft  them  asunder  were  the  noiseless  sunbeams. 
The  unequal  stress  and  strain  imparted  by  varying 
temperatures  clove  the  mountains  from  top  to  bot- 
tom as  with  a  stroke  of  the  earthquake's  hauuncr. 

109 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

In  and  about  Yosemite  Valley  one  sees  granite 
blocks  of  the  size  of  houses  and  churches  split  in  two 
where  they  lie  in  their  beds,  as  if  it  had  been  done 
in  their  sleep  and  without  awakening  them.  This 
silent  quarrying  and  reducing  of  the  rocks  never 
ceases  to  surprise  one.  Amid  the  petrified  forests  of 
Arizona  one  marvels  to  see  the  stone  trunks  of  the 
huge  trees  lying  about  in  yard  lengths  as  squarely 
and  cleanly  severed  as  if  done  with  a  saw.  Assault 
them  with  sledge  and  bar  and  you  may  reduce  them 
to  irregular  fragments,  but  you  cannot  divide  the 
blocks  neatly  and  regularly  as  time  has  done  it. 

The  unknown,  the  inaudible  forces  that  make  for 
good  in  every  state  and  community  —  the  gentle 
word,  the  kind  act,  the  forgiving  look,  the  quiet  de- 
meanor, the  silent  thinkers  and  workers,  the  cheerful 
and  unwearied  toilers,  the  scholar  in  his  study,  the 
scientist  in  his  laboratory  —  how  much  more  we 
owe  to  these  things  than  to  the  clamorous  and  dis- 
cordant voices  of  the  world  of  politics  and  the  news- 
paper!   Art,  literature,  philosophy,  all  speak  with 
the  still  small  voice.    How  much  more  potent  the 
voice  that  speaks  out  of  a  great  solitude  and  rever- 
ence than  the  noisy,  acrimonious,  and  disputatious 
voice!    Strong  conviction  and  firm  resolution  are 
usually  chary  of  words.   Depth  of  feeling  and  parsi- 
mony of  expression  go  well  together. 

The  mills  of  the  gods  upon  the  earth's  surface 
grind  exceeding  slow,  and  exceeding  still.  They  are 

110 


THE  STILL  S:\LVLL  VOICE 

grinding  up  the  rocks  everywhere  —  pulverizing  the 
granite,  the  Hmestone,  the  sandstone,  the  basalt, 
between  the  upper  and  nether  millstones  of  air  and 
water  to  make  the  soil,  but  we  hear  no  sound  and 
mark  no  change;  only  in  geologic  time  are  the  results 
recorded.  In  still  waters  we  get  the  rich  deposits 
that  add  to  the  fat  of  the  land,  and  in  peaceful,  un- 
troubled times  is  humanity  enriched,  and  the  foun- 
dations are  laid  upon  which  the  permanent  institu- 
tions of  a  nation  are  built. 

We  all  know  what  can  be  said  in  favor  of  turmoil, 
agitation,  w^ar;  we  all  know,  as  Goethe  said,  that  a 
man  comes  to  know  himself,  not  in  thought,  but  in 
action;  and  the  same  is  true  of  a  nation.  Equally  do 
w^e  know  the  value  of  repose,  and  the  slow,  silent 
activities  both  in  the  soul  of  man  and  in  the  proc- 
esses of  nature.  The  most  potent  and  beneficent 
forces  are  stillest.  The  strength  of  a  sentence  is  not 
in  its  adjectives,  but  in  its  verbs  and  nouns,  and  the 
strength  of  men  and  of  nations  is  in  their  calm,  sane, 
meditative  moments.  In  a  time  of  noise  and  hurry 
and  materialism  like  ours,  the  gospel  of  the  still 
small  voice  is  always  seasonable. 


VII 
NATURE  LEAVES 

I.    IN  WARBLER   TIME 

THIS  early  May  morning,  as  I  walked  through 
the  fields,  the  west  wind  brought  to  me  a  sweet, 
fresh  odor,  like  that  of  our  little  white  sweet  violet 
{Viola  blanda).  It  came  probably  from  sugar  maples, 
just  shaking  out  their  fringelike  blossoms,  and  from 
the  blooming  elms.  For  a  few  hours,  when  these  trees 
first  bloom,  they  shed  a  decided  perfume.  It  was  the 
first  breath  of  May,  and  very  welcome.  April  has 
her  odors,  too,  very  delicate  and  suggestive,  but 
seldom  is  the  wind  perfumed  with  the  breath  of 
actual  bloom  before  May.  I  said.  It  is  warbler  time; 
the  first  arrivals  of  the  pretty  little  migrants  should 
be  noted  now.  Hardly  had  my  thought  defined  itself, 
when  before  me,  in  a  little  hemlock,  I  caught  the 
flash  of  a  blue,  white-barred  wing;  then  glimpses  of 
a  yellow  breast  and  a  yellow  crown.  I  approached 
cautiously,  and  in  a  moment  more  had  a  full  view 
of  one  of  our  rarer  warblers,  the  blue-winged  yellow 
warbler.  Very  pretty  he  was,  too,  the  yellow  cap, 
the  yellow  breast,  and  the  black  streak  through  the 
eye  being  conspicuous  features.  He  would  not  stand 
to  be  looked  at  long,  but  soon  disappeared  in  a 
near-by  tree. 

112 


NATURE  LEAVES 

The  ruby-crowned  kinglet  was  piping  in  an  ever- 
green tree  not  far  away,  but  him  I  had  been  hearing 
for  several  daj^s.  \Yith  me  the  kinglets  come  before 
the  first  warblers,  and  may  be  known  to  the  attentive 
eye  by  their  quick,  nervous  movements,  and  small, 
olive-gray  forms,  and  to  the  discerning  ear  by  their 
hurried,  musical,  piping  strains.  How  soft,  how 
rapid,  how  joyous  and  lyrical  their  songs  are !  Very 
few  country  people,  I  imagine,  either  see  them  or 
hear  them.  The  powers  of  observation  of  country 
people  are  seldom  fine  enough  and  trained  enough. 
They  see  and  hear  coarsely.  An  object  must  be  big 
and  a  sound  loud,  to  attract  their  attention.  Have 
you  seen  and  heard  the  kinglet?  If  not,  the  finer  in- 
ner world  of  nature  is  a  sealed  book  to  you.  ^Yhen 
your  senses  take  in  the  kinglet  they  will  take  in  a 
thousand  other  objects  that  now  escape  you. 

My  first  warbler  in  the  spring  is  usually  the  yel- 
low redpoll,  which  I  see  in  April.  It  is  not  a  bird  of 
the  trees  and  woods,  but  of  low  bushes  in  the  open, 
often  alighting  upon  the  ground  in  quest  of  food. 
I  sometimes  see  it  on  the  lawn.  The  last  one  I  saw 
was  one  April  day,  when  I  went  over  to  the  creek  to 
see  if  the  suckers  were  yet  running  up.  The  bird 
was  flitting  amid  the  low  bushes,  now  and  then 
dropping  down  to  the  gravelly  bank  of  the  stream. 
Its  chestnut  crown  and  yellow  under  parts  were 
noticeable. 

The  past  season  I  saw  for  the  first  time  the  golden- 

113 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

winged  warbler  —  a  shy  bird,  that  eluded  me  a 
long  time  in  an  old  clearing  that  had  grown  up  with 
low  bushes.  The  song  first  attracted  my  attention, 
it  is  so  like  in  form  to  that  of  the  black-throated 
green-back,  but  in  quality  so  inferior.  The  first  dis- 
tant glimpse  of  the  bird,  too,  suggested  the  green- 
back, so  for  a  time  I  deceived  myself  with  the  notion 
that  it  was  the  green-back  with  some  defect  in  its 
vocal  organs.  A  day  or  two  later  I  heard  two  of 
them,  and  then  concluded  my  inference  was  a  hasty 
one.  Following  one  of  the  birds  up,  I  caught  sight  of 
its  yellow  crown,  which  is  much  more  conspicuous 
than  its  yellow  wing-bars.  Its  song  is  like  this,  *n-'n 
de  de  de,  with  a  peculiar  reedy  quality,  but  not  at  all 
musical,  falling  far  short  of  the  clear,  sweet,  lyrical 
song  of  the  green-back.  Nehrling  sees  in  it  a  resem- 
blance to  that  of  the  Maryland  yellow-throat,  but 
I  fail  to  see  any  resemblance  whatever. 

One  appreciates  how  bright  and  gay  the  plumage 
of  many  of  our  warblers  is  when  he  sees  one  of  them 
alight  upon  the  ground.  While  passing  along  a  wood 
road  in  June,  a  male  black-throated  green  came 
down  out  of  the  hemlocks  and  sat  for  a  moment  on 
the  ground  before  me.  How  out  of  place  he  looked, 
like  a  bit  of  ribbon  or  millinery  just  dropped  there ! 
The  throat  of  this  warbler  always  suggests  the  finest 
black  velvet.  Not  long  after  I  saw  the  chestnut- 
sided  warbler  do  the  same  thing.  We  were  trying 
to  make  it  out  in  a  tree  by  the  roadside,  when  it 

114 


NATURE  LEAVES 

dropped  down  quickly  to  the  ground  in  pursuit  of 
an  insect,  and  sat  a  moment  upon  the  brown  surface, 
giving  us  a  vivid  sense  of  its  bright  new  plumage. 

When  the  leaves  of  the  trees  are  just  unfolding, 
or,  as  Tennyson  says, 

"  When  all  the  woods  stand  in  a  mist  of  green. 
And  nothing  perfect," 

the  tide  of  migrating  warblers  is  at  its  height.  They 
come  in  the  night,  and  in  the  morning  the  trees  are 
alive  with  them.  The  apple-trees  are  just  showing 
the  pink,  and  how  closely  the  birds  inspect  them  in 
their  eager  quest  for  insect  food!  One  cold,  rainy 
day  at  this  season  Wilson's  black-cap  —  a  bird  that 
is  said  to  go  north  nearly  to  the  Arctic  Circle  — 
explored  an  apple-tree  in  front  of  my  window.  It 
came  down  within  two  feet  of  my  face,  as  I  stood  by 
the  pane,  and  paused  a  moment  in  its  hurry  and 
peered  in  at  me,  giving  me  an  admirable  view  of  its 
form  and  markings.  It  was  wet  and  hungry,  and  it 
had  a  long  journey  before  it.  What  a  small  body  to 
cover  such  a  distance! 

The  black-poll  warbler,  which  one  may  see  about 
the  same  time,  is  a  much  larger  bird  and  of  slower 
movement,  and  is  colored  much  like  the  black  and 
white  creeping  warbler  with  a  black  cap  on  its  head. 
The  song  of  this  bird  is  the  finest  in  volume  and  most 
insectlike  of  that  of  any  warbler  known  to  me.  It 
is  the  song  of  the  black  and  white  creeper  reduced, 
high  and  swelling  in  the  middle  and  low  and  faint 

115 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

at  its  beginning  and  ending.  When  one  has  learned 
to  note  and  discriminate  the  warblers,  he  has  made  a 
good  beginning  in  his  ornithological  studies. 

n.    A   SHORT   WALK 

One  midsummer  afternoon  I  went  up  to  "Scot- 
land" and  prowled  about  amid  the  raspberry-bushes, 
finding  a  little  fruit,  black  and  red,  here  and  there, 
and  letting  my  eyes  wander  to  the  distant  farms  and 
mountains.    The  wild  but  familiar  prospect  dilated 
and  rested  me.  As  I  lingered  near  the  torn  edge  of  the 
woods  in  a  tangle  of  raspberry-bushes,  I  caught  a 
glimpse  of  some  large  bird  dropping  suddenly  to  the 
ground  from  a  tall  basswood  that  stood  in  the  edge 
of  the  open,  where  it  was  hidden  from  my  view. 
Was  it  a  crow  or  a  hawk?  A  hawk,  I  guessed,  from 
its  manner  of  descent.   I  threw  a  stone  after  waiting 
some  moments  for  it  to  reappear,  but  it  made  no 
sign.    Then  I  moved  slowly  toward  the  spot,  and 
presently  up  sprang  a  hen-hawk  and,  uttering  its 
characteristic  squeal,  circled  around  near  me  and 
then  alighted  not  far  off.    A  young  hawk,  I  saw  it 
was,   and  quite  unsophisticated.     Presently,   as  I 
made  my  way  along,  just  touching  the  edge  of  the 
woods,  a  covey  of  nearly  full-grown  partridges  burst 
up  out  of  the  berry-bushes,  ten  or  twelve  of  them, 
and  went  humming  up  mto  the  denser  woods,  some 
of  them  alighting  in  the  trees,  whence  they  stretched 
their  necks  to  watch  me  as  I  passed  along.  The  dust 

116 


NATURE  LEAVES 

flew  from  their  plumage  as  they  jumped  up,  as  if 
they  had  been  earthing  their  wings. 

My  next  adventure  was  with  a  young  but  fully 
grown  bluebird,  which  crawled  and  fluttered  away 
from  my  feet  as  I  came  upon  it  in  the  open.  It 
could  not  fly,  and  I  easily  picked  it  up.  Its  plumage 
showed  the  mingled  blue  and  speckled  brown  of  the 
immature  bird.  I  looked  it  over,  but  could  see  no 
mark  or  sign  of  injury  to  wing  or  body.  Its  plum- 
age was  unruflfled  and  its  eye  bright,  but  its  move- 
ments were  feeble.  Was  it  ill  or  starved?  I  could  not 
tell  which,  probably  the  latter.  It  may  have  got 
lost  from  the  brood  and  was  not  yet  able  to  forage 
for  itself.  I  left  it  under  the  edge  of  a  rock,  where 
the  fresh  blue  of  the  ends  of  its  wings  and  tail  held 
niy  eye  a  moment  as  I  turned  to  go. 

Farther  along,  under  some  shelving  rocks,  I  came 
upon  two  empty  phoebes'  nests  —  a  relic  of  bird-life 
that  always  gives  a  touch  to  the  rocks  that  I  delight 
in.  I  find  none  of  these  nests  placed  lower  than 
three  feet  from  the  ground,  and  always  in  places 
that  seem  to  be  carefully  chosen  with  reference  to 
enemies  that  can  reach  and  climb. 

Two  or  three  woodchucks,  which  I  bagged  with 
my  eye,  completed  my  afternoon's  adventures. 

III.    IN   SOUTHERN   CALIFORNIA 

In  southern  California  the  seasons  all  go  hand  in 
hand,  and  dance  around  one  like  a  ring  of  girls,  first 

117 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

one  season,  then  another  in  front  of  you,  —  Spring, 
Summer,  Autumn,  Winter.  Now  in  March  I  see 
January  on  Mt.  San  Antonio,  with  wraiths  of  snow 
blowing  over  his  white  summit  against  the  blue  sky. 
In  the  valley  I  see  them  harvesting  oranges  and 
planting  their  gardens.  The  camphor-trees  are  shed- 
ding their  leaves,  and  the  eucalyptus  and  other  trees 
are  blooming.  The  oak-trees  are  shaking  out  their 
catkins  and  resound  with  the  hum  of  bees.  I  see  calla 
lilies  in  bloom  four  feet  high,  and  wild  flowers  an 
inch  high  just  opening.  Along  the  road  the  wild 
sunflowers  and  other  tall  plants  are  in  bloom,  as  in 
August  in  the  Atlantic  States.  June  is  in  the  knee- 
high  grass  and  oats  and  blooming  white  clover,  and 
April  in  the  bursting  apple-tree  buds  and  pink  peach- 
and  almond-trees,  —  yes,  and  in  the  new  furrow  and 
the  early  planting,  —  autumn  in  the  golden  orange- 
orchards,  and  the  red  berries  of  the  pepper-trees,  and 
the  black  berries  of  the  camphor-trees.  The  birds 
are  nesting,  the  shad  are  running,  and  swallows  are 
in  the  air,  midsummer  butterflies  dance  by,  and 
house-flies  tease  you  indoors.  I  see  and  hear  the 
white-crowned  sparrow  that  at  home  I  see  in  May. 
Spring,  Summer,  Autumn,  and  Winter,  I  say,  all 
nudge  you,  and  claim  your  attention  at  once. 

During  the  last  ten  days  of  March  there  were 
heavy  rains  with  four  feet  of  snow  in  the  near-by 
mountains.  The  air  was  like  cold  spring- water  — 
full  of  just  melted  frost. 

118 


NATURE  LEAVES 

Yesterday  friends  took  us  to  Chiremont,  a  ride 
of  thirty  miles,  in  their  automobile.  The  day  was 
all  sun  and  sky  above,  and  all  fresh  green  earth  be- 
low, with  a  line  of  snow-white  peaks  behind  dark 
near-by  mountain  barriers  on  the  horizon.  After 
a  week  or  more  of  cloud  and  rain,  how  we  enjoyed 
the  brightness  and  the  sunshine!  Especially  did 
that  line  of  white  peaks  cut  off  by  that  dark  moun- 
tain wall  in  front  of  them  draw  and  hold  my  eye. 
Over  the  top  of  the  highest  one,  San  Antonio,  we 
could  see  the  snow  lifted  by  the  wTst  wind  and  car- 
ried high  in  the  air  over  on  the  east  side.  It  was  like 
a  thin,  w^hite  flame,  swaying,  flickering,  sinking 
and  falling,  but  clinging  tenaciously  to  the  moun- 
tain-peak. Thus  have  I  seen  this  frost  flame  stalk 
across  my  native  hills  in  midwinter.  All  the  time  we 
were  speeding  through  orange-groves  yellow  with 
fruit,  along  improved  lands  red  with  the  new  fur- 
row, and  past  wild,  unclaimed  places  spotted  with 
the  bloom  of  many  flow^ers. 

I  think  the  bird  I  most  want  to  take  home 
with  me,  and  establish  in  our  towns  and  villages, 
is  the  blackbird,  —  Brewer's  blackbird,  —  one  of 
the  best-mannered,  best-dressed,  best-groomed  birds 
I  ever  saw.  He  is  like  a  bit  of  polished  ebony  moving 
quietly  over  your  lawn.  His  coat  has  the  same  rich 
iridescent  hues  as  that  of  our  crow  blackbird,  and 
he  has  the  same  yellow  eye,  but  he  is  nmch  less  in 
size  and  much  more  graceful  in  form  and  movement, 

119 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

and  much  softer- voiced.  Besides,  he  is  a  bird  of  the 
streets  and  dooryards,  very  noticeable  everywhere, 
and,  so  far  as  I  can  learn,  has  no  tastes  or  habits  that 
incur  the  enmity  of  the  farmer  or  the  fruit-grower. 
I  pass  within  a  few  feet  of  him  and  his  duller-colored 
mate  walking  about  the  smooth  lawns,  picking  some 
minute  insects  from  the  ends  of  the  grass-blades. 
This  seems  to  be  his  chief  occupation.  Like  all 
blackbirds,  these  are  social  and  gregarious,  and  at 
times,  when  in  flocks,  their  musical  instincts  are 
stimulated.  I  have  heard  a  band  of  them  in  the  later 
afternoon  discourse  a  wild,  pleasing  music  much 
superior  to  the  crude,  harsh  cackle  and  split  whistles 
of  the  related  species  with  us. 

The  birds  here  are  abundant  both  in  kinds  and 
in  numbers.  The  white-crowned  sparrows  are  fa- 
miliar about  the  houses  and  the  gardens,  and  they 
sing  most  sweetly,  but  the  song  is  not  quite  equal  to 
the  song  they  sing  along  the  Hudson  for  a  brief  day 
or  two  in  May.   Here  they  sing  for  weeks. 

The  mockingbirds  are  as  common  as  robins  are 
at  home  —  all  about  the  lawns  and  gardens  and 
streets,  flitting,  flirting,  attitudinizing,  and  singing 
—  on  the  housetops,  on  the  telegraph  and  telephone 
wires,  on  the  curbstones,  on  the  lawn.  In  the  face 
of  this  bird's  great  fame  as  a  songster,  I  wonder  why 
I  am  so  indifferent  to  it.  It  pleases  me  less  than 
do  its  cousins,  the  catbird  and  the  brown  thrasher. 
I  detect  little  or  no  music  —  sweet  tones  —  in  it.  It 

120 


NATURE  LEAVES 

is  a  series  of  disjointed  quirks  and  calls,  quite  sur- 
prising as  vocal  feats,  but,  to  my  ear,  entirely  desti- 
tute of  real  bird  melody.  It  is  a  performance,  the 
tricks  of  a  vocal  acrobat,  and  not  in  any  sense  a 
serious,  unified  song.  The  bird  has  much  less  music 
in  its  soul,  less  of  the  spirit  of  self-forgetting  joy  and 
praise,  than  has  our  little  song  sparrow.  I  would 
rather  have  one  robin,  or  one  song  sparrow,  about 
my  place  than  any  number  of  "mockers."  Indeed, 
the  more  "mockers"  there  were,  the  less  welcome 
they  would  be.  It  is  a  polyglot,  but  not  a  songster. 
The  mockingbird  is  a  theatrical  creature,  both  in 
manners  and  delivery.  I  have  heard  it  in  Jamaica, 
in  Florida,  and  now  in  southern  California,  and  I 
have  heard  it  by  night  and  by  day,  and  I  have  no 
good  word  to  say  for  it.  It  is  a  Southern  bird  and 
has  more  the  quality  of  the  Southern  races  than  our 
birds  have.  Northern  birds  are  quieter,  sweeter- 
tempered,  softer-voiced,  and  more  religious  in  tone. 

IV.  AEE  THERE  COUNTERFEITS  IN  NATURE? 

One  day  my  son  killed  a  duck  on  the  river  that  an 
old  gunner  told  him  was  a  mock  duck.  It  looked 
like  a  duck,  it  acted  and  quacked  like  a  duck,  but 
when  it  came  upon  the  table  it  mocked  us.  I  now 
recall  that  it  was  a  "coot,"  a  species  of  duck  not 
usually  eaten. 

The  incident  led  me  to  thinking  whether  or  not 
there  were  really  any  mock  things  —  any  couutcr- 

121 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

feits  in  nature  —  known  to  me.  Some  of  our  wild 
flowers  are  named  *'  false  "  this  and  that,  as  false 
indigo,  false  Solomon's-seal,  false  mitrewort,  and 
others;  but  in  designating  them  thus  we  are  simply 
slandering  Nature  and  exposing  our  own  ignorance. 
Other  things  come  to  mind  that  are  not  what 
they  seem,  or  what  they  are  popularly  called; 
*' cedar  plums,'*  for  instance,  —  those  yellow  fungous 
growths  upon  the  branches  of  the  red  cedar  which 
suddenly  develop  with  the  rain  and  warmth  of  May 
or  June,  and  that  look  like  ripe  fruit  upon  the  tree. 
In  sun  and  dryness  they  soon  shrink  and  wither;  on 
the  return  of  a  wet  day  they  are  again  clammy  ge- 
latinous masses.  Later  in  the  season  they  disappear 
entirely.  They  are  not  the  work  of  an  insect,  but  the 
result  of  some  disease  like  black-knot  on  our  plum- 
and  cherry-trees.  They  can  scarcely  be  called  coun- 
terfeit fruit.  The  so-called  oak-apple  bears  a  some- 
what closer  resemblance  to  a  genuine  fruit.  Its 
stringy  texture  might  be  taken  for  the  skeleton  of 
the  pulp  of  the  apple.  It  is  a  gall  caused  by  the 
sting  of  an  insect.  The  oak  is  made  to  grow  the  cell 
or  house  in  which  the  young  of  the  insect  is  hatched 
and  developed.  The  May  apples  which  children 
gather  from  the  wild  azalea  and  eat  with  much  rel- 
ish are  also  a  sham  fruit  —  the  work  of  an  insect. 

Can  we  call  the  infertile  flowers  of  certain  plants, 
like  those  of  the  fringed  polygala,  shams  or  counter- 
feits?   They  seem  to  exist  for  show  merely,  while 

122 


NATURE  LEAVES 

the  fertile  flowers  are  small  and  upon  the  roots  hid- 
den beneath  the  surface.  What  purpose  the  showy 
infertile  flowers  serve  in  the  economy  of  the  plant 
I  am  unable  to  say. 

In  the  Southern  States  the  plough  sometimes 
turns  out  of  the  soil  a  curious  vegetable  product 
called  "Tuckahoe,"  or  "Indian  loaf,"  that  suggests 
a  counterfeit  of  some  sort.  It  is  a  brown  roundish 
mass,  the  size  of  a  cocoanut  or  larger,  whitish  within, 
with  a  characteristic  odor,  and  it  is  said  to  be  use- 
ful and  nutritious  in  diseases  of  the  bowels.  It  is 
thought  that  the  Indians  used  it  as  a  kind  of  bread. 
Its  origin  is  shrouded  in  mystery.  What  it  springs 
from,  what  conditions  favor  its  growth,  are  all  un- 
known. It  is  not  a  fungus,  like  the  truffle,  nor  a 
normal  vegetable  product.  It  has  no  cellular  struc- 
ture, as  has  the  potato,  for  instance,  and  it  contains 
no  starch,  but  is  composed  mainly  of  pectin,  which 
for  the  most  part  makes  up  the  jellies  of  fruit.  It  is 
probably  the  result  of  degeneration  in  the  roots  of 
some  plant. 

Among  animals  shams  and  imitations  are  not 
uncommon.  The  marsh  wren,  for  instance,  often 
builds  several  sham,  or  cock,  nests  in  the  reeds  sur- 
rounding the  real  nest.  These  nests  seem  like  the 
mere  bubbling  over  or  surplusage  of  the  breeding- 
instinct  in  the  male.  Many  birds,  especially  ground- 
builders,  feign  lameness  or  paralj^sis  to  draw  atten- 
tion to  themselves  and  lure  the  intruder  away  from 

123 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

their  nests.  They  know  to  perfection  the  atl  of 
make-beheve.  The  males  of  bumblebees  and  wasps 
when  caught  will  imitate  perfectly  the  action  of  a 
bee  when  it  thrusts  its  stinger  into  your  hand. 

The  look  of  frightfulness  which  certain  caterpil- 
lars take  on  often,  in  the  shape  of  two  fierce  coun- 
terfeit eyes,  is  only  a  mask  to  scare  the  unsophisti- 
cated birds.  At  least  experiment  seems  to  prove 
that  this  is  the  case.  The  caterpillars  of  some  of  the 
hawk-moths  wear  this  frightful  mask.  These  insects 
can  so  retract  their  heads  and  front  segments  as  to 
give  an  increased  look  of  fearfulness.  Weismann 
found  that  certain  small  birds  were  afraid  of  them. 

When  one  insect  mimics  another  for  the  purpose 
of  protection,  as  is  now  generally  believed  to  be  the 
case  among  a  number  of  butterflies,  such  insect  is 
sailing  under  false  colors.  There  is  perhaps  more 
masquerading  in  nature  than  we  wot  of,  and  yet  it 
is  all  natural. 


VIII 

THE  PRIMAL  MIND 

I 

ONE  of  my  problems  is  how  to  reconcile  the 
unity  of  creation  with  the  fact,  or  apparent 
fact,  that  while  the  vast  mass  of  the  visible  universe 
is  governed  by  purely  physical  laws,  a  compara- 
tively small  part  of  it  is  dominated  by  laws  of  an- 
other order,  and  is  the  abode  of  life  and  intelligence. 
How  these  two  parts  or  phases  of  the  cosmos  are 
related,  how  we  can  ascribe  purpose  and  intelli- 
gence to  living  matter,  and  deny  them  to  the  non- 
living, without  doing  violence  to  our  sense  of  the 
oneness  of  universal  nature,  is  the  problem.  Are  we 
to  believe  that  the  universe  is  part  rational  and  part 
irrational?  —  that  mind  is  operative  in  the  grass,  the 
trees,  the  animals,  and  not  in  the  stars  and  sidereal 
systems? 

Emerson  celebrates 

"  the  primal  mind 
That  flows  in  streams,  that  breathes  in  wind." 

But  unless  we  identify  mind  with  cosmic  or  solar 
energy,  Emerson's  lines  do  not  seem  especially 
happy.  Is  it  possible  to  think  of  mind,  or  anything 
like  intelligence,  as  we  know  it  in  this  world,  as 

125 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

active  in  streams  or  winds  or  tides,  or  in  any  of  the 
blind  mechanical  forces?  All  these  things  go  their 
appointed  ways  and  their  ways  are  not  as  om-  ways; 
they  are  void  of  purpose,  void  of  will,  void  of  any 
suggestion  of  a  rational  principle;  they  are  ruled  by 
irrefragable  law. 

Mind  as  we  know  it,  and  can  only  know  it,  is 
associated  with  life.  Not  the  caressing  winds,  nor 
the  sparkling  currents,  nor  the  beauty  of  crystals 
and  precious  stones,  nor  the  glory  and  the  majesty 
of  the  heavens,  suggest  mind;  they  suggest  power 
and  measureless  energy.  The  midnight  skies  fill  us 
with  awe,  they  overwhelm  us  with  a  sense  of  our 
own  insignificance,  but  do  we  see  anything  akin  to 
ourselves  in  them?  Do  we  not  rather  see  that  which 
leaves  us  out  of  the  account  entirely?  An  infinity 
of  celestial  bodies  ruled  by  rigidly  mechanical  laws, 
going  their  inevitable  rounds  at  the  risk  of  cosmic 
collisions  and  disruptions  in  which  suns  and  systems 
are  at  times  shipwrecked,  unutterably  sublime  and 
awe-inspiring,  but  lifeless,  mindless,  unhuman.  In 
all  the  vast  depths  of  sidereal  space,  strewn  with 
celestial  bodies  as  a  June  meadow  with  clover  blos- 
soms, we  see  but  the  dance  and  whirl  of  dead  matter. 
The  heavens  declare  the  glory  of  a  god  who  hath  not 
one  attribute  akin  to  our  own.  What  shall  we  say, 
then?  What  can  we  say  but  that  this  astronomic 
background  of  cosmic  matter  and  energy  seems  but 
a  vast  theatre  upon  which  a  small  fraction  of  the 

126 


THE  PRIMAL  MIND 

whole,  clothed  with  new  powers  and  purposes,  plaj^s 
the  drama  of  organic  nature?  Who  can  say  that  it 
even  seems  designed  for  this  purpose?  On  the  con- 
trary, from  our  human  point  of  view,  how  casual 
and  uncertain  the  drama  appears!  Inside  of  this 
stupendous  carnival  of  the  physicochemical  forces 
—  at  far  removed  points,  and  doubtless  at  vast 
intervals  of  time,  flickering  here  and  there  in  the 
cosmic  darkness  like  a  dim  taper  —  appears  this 
mysterious  change,  this  light  which  we  call  life  and 
mind,  appears  and  disappears,  like  the  lamps  of  the 
fireflies  of  a  summer  night,  confined  to  a  very  narrow 
range  of  thermal  and  physical  conditions,  and,  in  its 
higher  manifestations  on  our  planet,  at  least,  limited 
to  a  very  narrow  period  of  time. 

In  our  solar  family  of  nine  planets  (considering 
the  asteroids  as  fragments  of  an  exploded  body  be- 
tween Mars  and  Jupiter)  only  one  is  unmistakably 
the  abode  of  life,  with  a  strong  probability  in  favor 
of  Mars.  Our  earth  is  the  seventh  child  of  the  Sun 
in  point  of  time,  and  on  it  life  is  clearly  as  yet  in  the 
heyday  of  youth.  But  what  an  enormous  prepon- 
derance of  lifeless  matter  the  other  planets  present ! 
Though  the  superior  planets  are  aons  older  and 
thousands  of  times  larger,  it  is  evident  that  they 
have  never  been  the  abode  of  life,  and  doubtful  if 
they  ever  can  be.  As  the  planets  are  all  made  of  one 
stuff,  and  the  same  physical  and  chemical  laws  are 
operative  in  all,  it  is  evident  that  the  conditions  of 

127 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

life  must  everywhere  be  essentially  the  same,  and 
hence  that  life  is  not  possible  on  the  major  and  minor 
planets  unless,  or  until,  conditions  upon  them  are 
similar  to  those  upon  the  earth.  But  what  astro- 
nomic significance  would  the  fact  have  if  life  never 
appeared  upon  any  of  the  other  planets,  nor  upon 
any  of  the  bodies  that  swarm  in  celestial  space? 
None  whatever.  The  vast  celestial  mechanism 
would  know  it  not.  Doubtless  there  are  untold 
worlds  where  life  has  never  appeared  and  never  will 
appear,  and  other  untold  worlds  upon  which  it  has 
appeared  and  has  run  its  course,  or  is  now  in  full 

career. 

The  natm-al  philosophers  tell  us  that  under  a  cer- 
tain size  a  planet  cannot  retain  an  atmosphere;  it 
drifts  away  to  the  larger  and  more  powerful  bodies. 
Probably  our  moon  has  never  had  an  atmosphere. 
They  also  tell  us  that  a  world  with  a  very  small  par- 
ticle of  radium  in  its  rocky  interior,  — two  parts  in  a 
million  million  parts,  —  like  our  earth,  must  inevi- 
tably, in  the  course  of  time  or  of  eternity,  explode. 
This  may  be  what  happened  to  the  body  of  which 
the  four  hundred  asteroids  are  fragments. 

What  a  comfort,  a  sort  of  cosmic  comfort,  it 
would  be  to  us  dwellers  upon  this  astronomic  mote, 
to  have  positive  proof  that  there  were  beings  like 
ourselves  upon  other  astronomic  motes  in  the  heav- 
ens around  us,  even  if  we  had  to  know  that  millions 
of  them  were  trying  desperately  to  extermmate  each 

128 


THE  PRIIVLVL  MIND 

other,  as  they  are  at  this  moment  upon  this  war- 
scarred  planet !  Astronomy  and  geology  grind  away 
at  their  everlasting  tasks,  but  biology  is  as  a  flower 
that  Cometh  in  a  day  and  on  the  morrow  is  cut  down. 
Our  greedy  anthropomorphism  sees  the  whole  uni- 
verse travailing  in  pain  to  bring  forth  man  —  sees 
him  as  the  sum  and  purpose  of  it  all;  but  clearly  the 
cosmic  gods  have  taken  very  little  thought  about 
him;  if  his  patrimony  is  this  vast  sidereal  province, 
he  is  likely  to  come  into  possession  of  a  very  small 
part  of  it.  He  is  of  secondary  importance,  as  are  all 
forms  of  life,  though  he  alone  can  assign  each  god 
his  rank  and  sit  in  judgment  in  the  council-chamber 
of  the  Infinite. 

I  am  only  trying  to  see  with  modern  eyes,  and  in 
the  light  of  modern  science,  what  the  old  Hebrew 
seers  and  prophets  saw  so  long  ago  —  the  littleness 
of  man,  and  his  brief,  uncertain  foothold  in  the  total 
scheme  of  things.  His  glory  is  that  he  is  a  part,  an 
infinitesimal  part,  of  this  total  scheme,  and  that 
with  his  finite  mind  he  can  to  some  extent  grasp  and 
measure  it.  The  secret  of  his  relation  to  it,  the  close- 
ness of  his  kinship  with  it,  whether  he  came  out  of 
it  through  the  inevitable  operation  of  natural  laws, 
or  was  grafted  upon  it  by  an  omnipotent  power 
external  to  it,  is  a  question  that  opens  up  a  line  of 
inquiry  of  which  he  never  tires. 

Is  it  possible  to  reconcile  the  revelations  of  astron- 
omy, of  geology,  of  paheontology,  —  the  waste,  the 

Ud 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

delays,  the  cosmic  cataclysms,  the  indifference  to 
life,  a  universe  sown  with  dead  worlds  and  with 
extinct  suns,  the  mindless  depths,  the  supremacy  of 
mechanical  laws,  the  unconscionable  energy,  —  all 
this  and  more,  with  our  ideas  of  a  beneficent,  om- 
nipotent being  governing  all,  of  whose  love  and 
concern  for  man  this  universe  is  the  expression? 

The  imiverse  as  the  theatre  of  mechanical  laws  — • 
the  action  and  interaction  of  matter  and  energy  — • 
is  godless;  neither  human  nor  divine  attributes  are 
displayed  there.  It  is  only  as  the  theatre  of  biologi- 
cal laws  that  we  can  recognize  in  it  the  sources  of 
our  own  lives  or  get  any  glimpse  of  what  we  call 
mind.  The  source  and  fountain  of  life  in  the  uni- 
verse is  clearly  no  more  intent  upon  man  than  upon 
any  other  form  of  life,  even  the  humblest.  All  life 
is  cheap  in  the  presence  of  the  material  forces.  The 
tempest  and  the  earthquake  blot  out  human  com- 
munities as  unhesitatingly  as  they  blot  out  commu- 
nities of  ants  and  mice.  Fire,  flood,  gravity,  and 
chemical  affinity  respect  nothing  that  lives.  The 
organizing  tendency  in  matter,  whatever  be  its 
source,  works  as  if  it  knew  what  it  wanted  when  not 
interfered  with;  it  builds  up  its  predetermined  forms 
and  hands  the  secret  of  the  craft  down  to  succeed- 
ing generations  unerringly,  so  long  as  nothing  di- 
verts or  confuses  it,  or  imposes  foreign  purpose  upon 
it,  as  do  the  many  parasites  of  the  animal  and  vege- 
table world.    An  insect  stings  a  leaf  or  a  stalk  and 

130 


THE  PRIMAL  MIND 

thus  diverts  the  Hfe-energies  of  the  phint  to  its  o\\ti 
purpose.  In  the  case  of  maHgnant  tumors,  the  Hfe- 
energy  of  the  body  consumes  itself.  The  hostile 
germs  destroy  the  body  by  the  use  of  the  vital  energy 
which  the  body  furnishes.  The  body  can  be  made  to 
destroy  itself,  to  eat  itself  up. 

II 

Interfere  with  the  normal  currents  and  course  of 
life  in  the  mother's  body,  and  her  womb  grows  a 
monstrosity  or  hideous  deformity;  the  cells  go  on 
building  blindly;  the  push  of  life  is  not  abated,  but 
it  has  lost  its  way  or  forgotten  its  plan ;  it  wanders 
aimlessly.  Now,  what  gives  it  a  plan,  or  guided  it 
through  all  its  vagaries  and  wanderings  in  the  lowly 
or  monstrous  forms  of  the  foreworld,  till  it  built  up 
man  from  the  ape,  and  the  bird  from  the  fish  or  rep- 
tile .^^  Natural  selection,  the  Darwinians  say.  But 
there  must  be  a  variety  to  select  from,  and  some 
scheme  or  purpose  in  the  selecting  agent.  Mechani- 
cal laws  may  select  the  strongest,  or  the  largest,  or 
the  smallest,  as  the  case  may  be,  but  not  the  fittest. 
The  fittest  implies  a  scheme,  implies  progression. 
The  survival  of  the  fittest  implies  the  push  of  life, 
the  aspiration,  as  it  were,  toward  higher  forms.  How 
could  the  gift  of  mind  be  brought  about  by  mechan- 
ical means,  unless  there  was  incipient  mind  —  a 
tendency  to  mind  —  in  the  struggling  forms?  The 
physicochemical  forces  are  not  creative;  they  bring 

131 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

about  startling  changes,  but  have  their  cycles ;  they 
go  their  rounds  over  and  over,  and  can  never  depart 
from  them.  Oxygen  and  hydrogen  unite  to  form 
water,  sodium  and  chlorine  unite  to  form  salt,  but 
their  formulas  do  not  vary,  and  they  lose  nothing 
in  the  cycle  of  change;  their  elements  can  be  sepa- 
rated and  reunited  any  number  of  times.  Not  so 
with  any  living  thing. 

Intelligence,  then,  seems  inseparable  from  life. 
Wherever  we  see  adaptation  as  opposed  to  mere 
time-induced  adjustment,  and  purposive  forms  and 
movements  as  contrasted  with  mechanical  and  acci- 
dental forms  and  movements,  we  recognize  the  ac- 
tion of  mind;  do  we  not?  The  use  of  specific  means 
to  specific  ends  indicates  what  we  have  no  name  for 
but  intelligence.  It  is  obvious  that  the  hairs  on 
plants,  the  varnish  on  leaves,  the  wax  on  buds,  the 
hooks,  wings,  balloons,  on  seeds,  all  have  a  specific 
purpose;  that  is,  these  things  are  true  devices,  and 
not  merely  chance  combinations  or  fortuitous  occur- 
rences. The  ingenious  devices  of  certain  plants  to 
insure  cross-fertilization  are,  to  me,  just  as  much 
an  evidence  of  what  we  must  call  mind,  though  of 
mind  of  a  vastly  different  order  from  our  own,  as 
any  model  or  device  in  our  patent  oflSices,  while  the 
forms  of  the  rocks,  the  hills,  the  shore,  the  streams, 
the  rivers,  are  in  no  sense  purposive. 

If  man,  with  all  his  powers  and  attributes,  is  a 
part  of  nature,  —  and  the  naturalist  can  regard  him 

132 


THE  PRIMAL  MIND 

in  no  other  light,  —  if  the  sun  is  his  father  and  the 
earth  his  mother  as  Hterally  as  they  are  the  parents 
of  all  other  forms  of  life,  then  all  that  he  is  or  can 
be  is  latent  or  potential  in  nature;  then  is  his  human- 
ity, his  reverence,  his  love  as  much  a  part  of  nature 
as  are  the  instincts  and  the  cuniang  of  animals  a 
part  of  nature;  then  is  his  literature,  his  philosophy, 
his  art,  his  religion  a  part  of  nature;  then  is  he  as 
amenable  to  biological  laws  and  as  truly  a  subject 
for  the  natural  historian  as  are  the  animals;  then 
also  are  all  his  follies,  sins,  shortcomings,  supersti- 
tions, cruelties,  ingratitudes,  and  the  rest  a  part  of 
what  we  call  nature.  If  not  so,  then  of  what  are  they 
a  part?    Man  is  not  separated  from  nature  by  his 
body;  he  is  dependent  upon  the  material  elements 
and  forces  —  upon  the  air,  the  water,  the  soil  —  to 
the  same  extent  and  by  virtue  of  the  same  organs 
and  relations  as  are  all  other  forms  of  life.    He  is 
begotten  and  nourished  like  all  other  animals,  and 
he  dies  as  they  do.    He  differs  from  all  others  in  his 
mental  and  spiritual  equipment,  but  in  view  of  his 
humble  remote  ancestry,  as  seen  in  the  light  of  palae- 
ontology, and  the  gradations  of  intelligence  and  com- 
plexity of  organization  between  him  and  them,  can 
there  be  any  doubt  that  these  gifts  also  come  out  of 
nature?   Can  there  be  any  doubt  that  what  we  must 
call  mind  pervades  at  least  all  organic  matter,  and, 
potentially,  all  other  forms? 

Where  would  you  have  man's  mind  come  from? 

133 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

The  supernatural?  Then  let  us  name  it  the  natural- 
supernatural,  as  Carlyle  did?  Let  us  annex  all  the 
territory  that  adjoins  us;  let  us  put  a  circle  around 
every  reality  we  can  conceive  of,  and  regard  the 
universe  as  one,  and  not  as  two  or  three.  Carlyle's 
idea  of  the  natural-supernatural  still  permitted  him 
to  look  upon  nature  as  the  "  Time- vesture  of  God, 
which  reveals  him  to  the  wise,  and  hides  him  from 
the  foolish";  but  the  notion  of  vesture  or  clothes 
suggests  an  arbitrary  and  artificial  relation  which  is 
more  in  consonance  with  theology  than  with  science 
or  with  life.  Goethe's  expression  "the  living  gar- 
ment of  God  "  is  less  misleading,  but  Pope's  familiar 
couplet,  — 

"  All  are  but  parts  of  one  stupendous  whole. 
Whose  body  Nature  is,  and  God,  the  soul,"  — 

is  the  least  objectionable  of  all,  as  this  restores  the 
vital  unity  which  must  exist. 

If  Nature  be  half  God  and  half  demon,  it  is  all  the 
more  easy  to  believe  that  man  arose  out  of  her,  since 
these  terms  fitly  describe  him  also.  We  say  that 
the  fountain  cannot  rise  above  its  source,  but  surely 
the  source  is  usually  above  the  fountain,  and  if  we 
choose  to  conceive  of  this  God-nature  as  much  above 
man,  there  is  still  room  for  a  broad  ground  of  rela- 
tionship between  them.  Nature  is  cruel  and  blun- 
dering and  irrational,  and  does  not  the  present  world- 
war  exhibit  man  as  her  legitimate  offspring?  How 
the  gods  on  Olympus  must  smile  and  chuckle  and 

134 


THE  PRIMAL  MIND 

say,  "Surely  they  are  our  children,  bone  of  our  bone, 
and  flesh  of  our  flesh"! 

A  recent  critic  says  that  my  principal  mistake  is 
in  considering  life  and  mind  as  concrete  realities 
when,  in  fact,  they  are  only  abstract  terms,  indicat- 
ing conditions  of  matter.  In  the  act  of  denying 
mind  do  we  not  affirm  mind?  What  is  it  but  mind 
that  makes  that  statement  denying  all  reality  to 
mind?  Is  not  the  assertion  self-destructive?  If  we 
affirm  that  the  only  concrete  reality  is  matter,  what 
are  we  going  to  do  about  our  minds  that  make  this 
affirmation?  Are  they  unreal  or  nonentities?  Can 
a  nonentity  grasp  and  weigh  an  entity?  We  cannot 
use  our  eyes  to  prove  that  there  are  no  eyes  in  the 
universe,  nor  our  reason  to  dethrone  reason.  Sci- 
ence cannot  cut  the  ground  from  under  its  own  feet. 
Huxley  was  convinced  that  there  were  three  realities 
in  the  universe  —  matter,  energy,  and  consciousness. 
How  could  he  affirm  the  reality  of  matter  and  energy 
if  he  denied  the  reality  of  that  which  affirmed  it? 
If  we  are  not  sure  of  our  own  existence  as  knowing, 
reasoning  beings,  how  can  we  be  sure  of  this  uncor- 
tainty?  Our  light  is  self -extinguished;  mind,  or 
consciousness,  belongs  to  a  difi^erent  order  of  reality 
than  do  matter  and  energy.  We  know  mind  only  as 
a  subjective  reality,  whereas  we  know  matter  and 
energy  as  objective  realities.  Destroy  all  life  and 
consciousness  in  the  world  of  matter,  and  energy 
still  exists.    Of  course,  this  assertion  is  also  sclf- 

135 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

contradictory,  as  we  postulate  ourselves  as  still 
being  witnesses  of  the  existence  of  matter  and  en- 
ergy. Blot  out  life  and  mind,  and,  so  far  as  we  are 
concerned,  there  is  nothing  left.  We  cannot  get  rid 
of  ourselves  without  turning  the  universe  topsy- 
turvy, and  even  then  we  are  on  hand  to  bear  witness 
that  it  is  topsy-turvy.  In  my  youth  I  once  heard  an 
old  Methodist  preacher  say  that  we  could  not  con- 
ceive of  annihilation  without  thinking  of  our  unan- 
nihilated  selves  as  looking  on. 

The  modern,  rigidly  scientific  mind,  in  consider- 
ing this  question  of  life,  gets  right  down  to  the 
ground  and  denies  everything  we  call  spirit,  mind, 
soul,  creative  energy,  and  the  like.  Man  is  a  ma- 
chine and  only  a  machine,  it  says,  run  by  the  phys- 
icochemical  forces.  His  brain  is  only  a  photochemi- 
cal mirror,  his  thoughts  only  molecular  activities. 

Mind,  or  our  mental  states,  is  only  a  name  for 
complex  physicochemical  processes  in  the  brain- 
substance.  But  what  is  it  that  understands  and 
names  these  processes?  Can  a  physicochemical 
process  write  a  poem,  or  paint  a  picture,  or  weigh 
the  stars? 

Modern  biophysics  sees  no  more  evidence  of 
mind  in  living  processes  than  in  non-living.  Intelli- 
gence is  only  a  sequence  of  physical  states  caused 
by  physical  stimuli.  The  brain  is  no  more  creative 
than  is  the  prism  when  it  divides  a  ray  of  light  into 
the  component  colors  of  the  spectrum.  The  division 

136 


THE  PRBLVL  MIND 

of  a  drop  of  water  into  two  drops  or  the  union  of 
two  drops  into  one  by  chemical  changes  inside  them 
involves  the  same  forces  that  cell-division  involves, 
and  cell-division  is  a  no  more  mysterious  process. 
Life  is  nothing  but  chemistry  and  physics;  mind, 
soul,  consciousness,  only  a  sequence  of  chemical 
and  physical  changes  in  the  brain-substance.  But 
what  about  the  living  brain-substance?  Do  these 
same  changes  beget  mind  or  soul  when  controlled 
in  the  laboratory?  Does  the  compound  in  your 
retort  think,  and  speculate  about  itself?  Is  there  not 
something  in  living  beings  that  science  does  not  take 
account  of? 

Mankind  has  long  believed  in  a  spiritual  order  of 
reality,  and  in  so  doing  it  is  only  affirming  the  reality 
of  that  which  distinguishes  it  from  stocks  and  stones. 
The  psychic  world  is  as  much  a  matter  of  fact  to  us 
as  is  the  world  of  matter  and  energy;  because  the 
first  fact  is  consciousness  of  self,  it  is  that  which  rec- 
ognizes the  world  of  matter  and  energy.  The  I  is  the 
pillar  that  upholds  the  very  heavens ;  it  is  the  veri- 
table creator  of  the  world  and  of  all  the  gods  that  ride 
over  it.  But  to  what  extent,  if  any,  it  is  independ- 
ent of  matter  and  energy,  or  has  been  in  the  past,  or 
may  be  in  the  future,  is  a  question.  (How  contra- 
dictory all  these  questions  are!  The  only  realities 
to  us  are  our  varying  states  of  consciousness.  To 
the  dead  in  their  graves  there  is  no  death;  death  is 
real  only  to  the  living.) 

137 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

All  living  things  know;  they  know  what  they 
want,  they  know  how  to  multiply,  they  know  how 
to  fit  themselves  to  their  environment.   We  cannot 
in  the  same  sense  ascribe  intelligence  to  any  of  the 
motions  of  inert  matter;  they  are  blind,  fateful, 
stereotyped.     The    cell    is    an    intelligent    being; 
through  the  chemicophysical  forces  it  builds  up  a 
man  and  fits  him  with  a  brain  and  all  his  wonderful 
organs  and  powers.    It  builds  the  flower,  the  seed, 
the  leaf,  the  stalk,  the  root,  and  through  the  mystery 
of  inheritance  keeps  up  the  succession  of  its  kind. 
Back  of  the  cell  is  unorganized  protoplasm,  back  of 
that  must  lie  still  lower  conditions  of  matter,  and 
so  down  till  we  come  to  the  inorganic.  But  what  is 
it  that  sets  the  process  of  organization  going  and 
keeps  it  up  and  pushes  on  and  on  through  the  bio- 
logic ages,  from  lower  to  higher  till  man  is  reached? 
Darwin  says  natural  selection.   But  clearly  natural 
selection  is  a  secondary  process;  there  must  be  a 
primeval  onward  impulse,  something  that  profits  by 
selection,   something  that  knows  in  a  blind  way 
what  it  wants;  that  struggles,  that  gains  and  loses, 
and  that  has  a  goal.   The  weak,  the  unfit,  drop  out; 
that  is  natural  rejection.  The  strong,  the  fit,  press  on; 
that  is  natural  selection.   But  if  there  were  no  plan 
or  purpose,  no  urge  from  behind,  no  end  to  be 
achieved,  there  would  be  neither  selection  nor  re- 
jection.   Live  things  would  progress  no  more  than 
do  the  pebbles  on  the  beach.  Do  we  not  have  to 

138 


THE  PRIMAL  MIND 

postulate  a  primal  impulse  toward  development?  I3 
it  all  pure  mechanics? 

Of  course,  in  saying  all  this  we  are  ascribing  our 
intelligence  to  nature,  and  we  cannot  do  otherwise. 
We  can  think  of  degrees  of  intelligence,  but  not  of 
kinds.  Evolution  in  the  inorganic  world  has  been 
a  purely  chemicomechanical  process,  but  in  the  or- 
ganic there  has  been  a  new  factor,  supermechanical 
and  superchemical.  We  are  forced  to  think  of  it  in 
those  terms. 

Think  of  the  blind,  irrational,  or,  at  least,  un- 
rational  forces  that  are  careering  over  the  earth  at 
this  moment,  and  every  moment,  —  in  the  winds, 
the  tides,  the  rains,  the  storms,  the  floods,  the  river 
and  ocean  currents,  —  changing  its  surface,  pulling 
down,  building  up,  transporting;  sleeping  here, 
raging  there;  one  moment  fostering  life,  the  next, 
destroying  it;  malignant  or  benevolent  according  as 
we  place  ourselves  in  relation  to  them;  and  all,  from 
our  point  of  view,  without  intelligent  guidance.  No 
engineer  has  planned  the  drainage-system  of  the 
globe,  and  yet  see  how  surely  the  waters  find  their 
way  to  the  sea. 

I  can  see  nothing  in  the  operations  of  inorganic 
nature  analogous  to  human  intelligence  or  human 
benevolence,  or,  I  may  add,  analogous  to  human 
malevolence.  Human  intelligence  would  go  more 
directly  to  its  goal  and  avoid  the  waste,  the  delay, 
the  suffering,  the  failures,  that  we  see  about  us.  We 

139 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

do  not  plant  our  forests  or  sow  our  seed  or  trim  our 
trees,  or  drain  our  land,  as  Nature  does;  we  abbrevi- 
ate, and  select,  and  take  short  cuts,  and  do  in  a  sea- 
son what  Nature  takes  years  to  accomplish.  Her 
forests  get  planted,  her  trees  get  trimmed,  her  canals 
get  dug,  but  think  how  modern  business  methods 
would  improve  her  processes.  We  see  what  we  call 
intelligence  in  organic  nature,  —  adaptation,  selec- 
tion, the  use  of  means  to  an  end,  —  but  it  is  all  a 
kind  of  blind,  groping,  experimenting  intelligence, 
like  that  of  man  in  a  new  and  strange  field,  when  he 
feels  his  way,  tries  and  tries  again,  and  reaches  his 
end  after  many  delays  and  failures. 

If  our  minds  only  knew  all  that  our  bodies  know, 
or  knew  how  our  bodies  come  to  know  the  things 
they  seem  to  know,  then  we  should  have  the  secret 
of  organization,  of  inheritance,  of  adaptation,  and 
of  many  other  things.  The  body  knows  how  to 
build  itself  up  from  single  cells,  how  to  preserve  its 
form,  how  to  run  itself,  how  to  repair  and  reproduce 
itself,  and  many  other  things.  But  it  does  not  know 
how  to  combat  certain  enemies  that  attack  it  as  well 
as  we  know  how.  We  can  aid  it  in  many  of  its  func- 
tions, and  relieve  it  in  many  of  its  obstructions. 

What  I  know,  and  what  my  body  knows,  are  two 
different  things.  We  can  separate  the  mind  from 
the  body  in  this  way,  and  we  can  and  do  separate 
man  from  physical  nature  in  the  same  way,  but  the 
truth  is  that  the  mind  and  the  body  are  one,  and 

140 


P 


THE  PRIMiVL  MIND 

man  and  the  universe  are  one.  Yet  the  body  seems 
to  know  things  which  the  mind  does  not  know,  as 
there  is  a  wisdom  in  the  universe  that  man  cannot 
compass.  We  separate  ourselves  in  thought  from 
our  bodies,  on  the  one  hand,  and  from  the  universe, 
on  the  other,  while  in  reality  the  unity  in  both  cases 
is  complete. 

I  think  the  knowledge  the  animal  seems  to  possess 
is  of  the  same  kind  and  degree  as  the  knowledge  its 
body  seems  to  possess,  and  which  enables  it  to  dis- 
charge all  its  functions  and  build  itself  up  and  repro- 
duce itself.  But  man  transcends  his  body,  he  knows 
more  than  it  does,  more  than  outward  nature  about 
him  does.  It  is  as  if  he  had  eyes  while  they  had  only 
the  sense  of  touch.  His  reason  is  his  mind's  eye; 
man  sees,  but  his  dog,  as  it  were,  goes  by  touch. 


IX 

"FATED  TO  BE  FREE" 
I 

THE  question  of  fate  and  free  will  is  hoary 
with  age.  In  touching  upon  the  subject  here,  I 
have  little  hope  that  I  can  put  a  youthful  face  upon 
it.  But  it  seems  to  me  that  the  question  has  been 
discussed  mainly  on  religious  and  metaphysical 
grounds.  I  have  in  mind  to  see  what  light  can  be 
thrown  upon  the  subject  from  the  consideration  of 
our  relation  to  the  natural  world  around  us  and 
within  us.  The  moment  we  think  of  ourselves  as  a 
part  of  this  natural  world,  with  its  laws  and  forces 
vital  within  us  and  an  innate  part  of  our  essential 
being,  the  problem  takes  on  a  new  aspect.  The  neces- 
sity that  rules  us  is  no  longer  foreign  to  us,  but  is  the 
essence  of  our  own  wills.  Our  sense  of  freedom  is 
as  clear  and  secure  as  our  own  eyesight. 

The  phrase  "fated  to  be  free,"  is  Emerson's,  and 
well  expresses  the  kind  of  contradiction  and  mar- 
riage of  opposites  that  we  find  everywhere  in  nature 
and  in  life.  "Man  is  fated  to  be  free."  The  deter- 
minism of  the  nature  within  him  and  without  him 
does  not  blunt  or  abridge  his  sense  of  absolute  free- 
dom of  choice.  He  always  feels  himself  free  to  choose 

142 


« 


FATED  TO  BE  FREE" 


between  two  objects  or  two  courses  of  action,  no 
matter  how  much  in  reaUty  he  may  be  in  the  grip 
of  the  necessity  that  rules  in  the  sequence  of  cause 
and  effect. 

Our  relation  to  the  atmosphere  well  illustrates 
the  principle  of  fate  and  free  will.  We  live  at  the 
bottom  of  a  great  atmospheric  sea  in  which  we  move 
with  the  utmost  freedom,  but  which  yet  presses 
upon  us  with  the  force  of  many  tons'  weight.  We 
are  not  conscious  of  this  enormous  pressure  because 
om*  organizations  are  adapted  to  it;  we  are  born 
and  grow  up  under  its  influence  as  do  the  fish  in 
the  bottom  of  the  sea  under  water  pressure.  It  is 
not  the  pressure  of  a  burden;  our  freedom  is  un- 
hampered; the  frailest  bubble  is  not  affected  by  it, 
because  the  pressure  from  within  neutralizes  the 
pressure  from  without.  Herein  we  see  the  fatalism 
of  nature,  which  presses  upon  us  so  heavily  from  all 
sides  and  yet  leaves  us  with  a  sense  of  perfect  free- 
dom and  spontaneity  because  it  acts  w^ithin  us  as  well 
as  without  —  in  the  mechanism  of  our  bodies  and  in 
our  inherited  traits  and  dispositions,  as  well  as  in  the 
external  forces  that  constantly  play  upon  us.  The 
fatalism  of  nature  working  within  us  does  not  hamper 
us  because,  I  repeat,  it  is  a  part  of  our  very  selves.  We 
are  always  free  to  do  what  we  like,  because  we  never 
like  to  do  what  is  contrary  to  the  nature  within  us. 
In  one  sense,  therefore,  we  are  not  free  at  all,  be- 
cause we  are  a  part  of  that  nature  which  is  greater 

143 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

than  we  are,  and  which  works  over  us  and  through 
us.  In  another  sense  we  are  absolutely  free,  because 
that  nature  is  vital  within  us  and  is  the  pith  and 
marrow  of  our  own  wills.  We  cannot  separate  our- 
selves from  the  world  of  forces  that  surround  us,  and 
set  up  on  our  own  account  as  independent  centres  of 
energy,  but  what  we  call  our  wills  give  us  power  in 
a  measure  to  direct  and  modify  the  very  nature  of 
which  we  form  a  part. 

Nature  works  us  cunningly  as  a  machine  is  worked 
by  external  forces,  and  yet  we  know  it  not.  How 
sure  we  are,  for  instance,  that  we  draw  the  air  into 
our  lungs  when  we  breathe,  as  literally  as  we  put 
the  food  into  our  mouths !  The  universal  mechanical 
principle  involved,  in  other  words,  the  involuntary 
nature  of  our  breathing,  we  never  suspect.  Can  we 
not  breathe  fast  or  slow,  deeply  or  superficially, 
practice  abdominal  breathing  or  chest  breathing,  or 
even  inhibit  breathing  for  a  minute  or  more?  How 
free  the  act  seems  to  be,  and  yet  the  chest  is  a 
bellows  over  which  our  wills  have  but  slight  control. 
Our  freedom  in  breathing,  as  in  many  other  acts,  is 
freedom  inside  of  a  stern  necessity.  We  are  free 
inside  of  the  iron  circle  of  fate;  or,  to  use  a  still 
better  image,  we  are  free  to  move  inside  the  ship,  or 
on  the  train  that  is  carrying  us  along.  We  are  free 
to  obey  our  natures,  our  spontaneous  promptings, 
but  all  these  things  are  rings  of  fate  around  us. 
They  bear  us  along,  but  we  can  move  a  little  in 

144 


"FATED  TO  BE  FREE" 

other  directions  while,  at  the  same  time,  we  are 
moving  with  these  currents.  By  an  effort  of  will  we 
can  deny  ourselves  this  or  that,  inhibit  for  a  time 
this  or  that  tendency,  but  no  effort  of  will  can  make 
us  wise,  or  happy,  or  angry,  or  in  love,  or  hungry, 
or  sad,  nor  can  it  make  one  temperament  as  calm, 
as  patient,  as  sanguine  as  another. 

We  are  more  conscious  of  the  pull  of  gravity  be- 
cause that  is  in  one  direction  only;  but  we  do  not 
know  that  the  force  which  our  body  exerts  through 
its  various  complex  movements  is  the  force  of  grav- 
ity which  the  earth  gives  us.  We  overcome  gravity 
with  every  step  we  take,  only  by  using  gravity.  If 
our  bodies  were  devoid  of  weight,  how  could  we 
exert  force  .^  We  are  strong  by  that  which  opposes 
us,  and  which  will  crush  us  if  we  give  it  a  chance.  We 
are  fitted  into  the  complex  of  forces  which  runs  this 
universe  in  such  a  subtle  way  that  we  are  run  by 
it  without  being  aware  of  the  fact.  We  do  not 
know  that  the  air  is  forced  into  our  lungs  when  we 
breathe,  the  water  into  our  mouths  when  we  drink, 
and  the  force  of  gravity  into  our  limbs  when  we 
walk.  Life  is  that  mysterious  something  which 
alone  uses  and  rises  above  the  material  forces  in 
this  manner.  Life  makes  servants  of  the  energy  of 
the  non-living.  It  is  a  part  of  the  fate  which  it  tri- 
umphs over.  It  turns  the  material  forces  against 
themselves;  it  defeats  gravity  by  the  aid  of  gravity; 
it  fights  fire  with  fire;  it  outwits  the  wind  by  the  aid 

145 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

of  the  wind.    The  organism  is  built  up  by  the  same 
chemical  reactions  that  would  pull  it  down;    its 
strength  is  the  strength  of  the  forces  it  has  over- 
come.  Life  has  no  capital  but  that  which  it  draws 
from  the  non-living.    The  modus  operandi  of  this 
drawing  science  may  analyze  and  explain,  but  the 
secret  of  life  itself  —  that  impulse  which  lifts  this 
wave  of  matter  up  into  these  myriads  of  living 
forms  —  is  beyond  the  reach  of  scientific  analysis. 
Our  breathing  and  drinking,  I  have  said,  are  on 
the  principle  of  the  bellows,  but  the  bellows  implies 
the  man  working  it.    So  our  breathing  implies  the 
life-principle   working   the   respiratory   apparatus; 
but  working  from  within,  not  from  without,  sus- 
taining a  vital  and  not  merely  a  mechanical  relation 
to  it.   Of  this  we  have  no  parallel  in  our  mechanical 
contrivances.    The  nearest  we  can  come  to  it  is  in 
the  electromagnetic   world,  where   the  active  and 
potent  principle  is  inseparable  from  the  ponderable 
body  which  it  animates. 

A  man  may  repeat  the  type  of  character  of  his 
father  or  grandfather  —  the  main  course  of  his  life 
may  be  determined  by  his  unconscious  inheritances, 
or  by  his  race,  and  the  nation  of  which  he  forms 
a  part,  and  yet  have  the  utmost  sense  of  freedom, 
because  these  things  do  not  act  as  external  or  for- 
eign forces,  but  form  the  body  and  substance  of 
his    inmost    personality;  his  identity  is  one  with 

them. 

146 


"FATED  TO  BE  FREE" 

How  can  we  separate  the  energy  that  acts  within  us, 
giving  power  to  our  muscles  and  all  our  movements, 
that  is  the  source  of  our  weight  and  the  strength  of 
our  hands,  from  the  energy  that  acts  without  us, 
that  checks  or  restrains  all  our  movements?  They 
are  both  one  and  the  same.  We  overcome  gravity 
with  gravity.  We  break  its  pull  whenever  we  lift 
our  feet,  or  hurl  a  weight,  or  raise  any  object  from 
the  ground.  The  cyclone  that  hfts  your  house  from 
its  foundations,  and  levels  forests,  and  heaps  up  the 
waves  could  do  nothing  without  the  weight  which 
gravity  imparts  to  the  air.  The  force  that  sets  the 
air  in  motion  —  thermic  or  electric,  a  steep  gradient 
of  temperature  or  an  electromagnetic  strain  —  is 
probably  not  of  gravitational  origin.  In  vegetable 
life  what  we  used  to  call  a  vital  force  lifts  matter  up 
in  opposition  to  gravity  —  lifts  tons  of  water  up 
into  the  trees,  and  tons  of  lime  and  potash  and  other 
earth  salts,  but  does  it  by  mechanical  and  chemical 
means. 

The  vital  and  the  physical  are  inseparably  united, 
and  play  into  each  other's  hands.  In  animal  life, 
mechanical  and  chemical  principles  are  equally 
active  in  all  living  bodies.  In  the  higher  forms  a 
psychic  principle  comes  into  play.  The  will  of  man 
through  mechanical  means  reverses  or  controls  the 
action  of  gravitation  and  directs  chemical  reactions 
—  in  every  instance  two  contraries  work  together 
and  make  one  whole. 

147 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

n 

Life  and  nature  and  philosophy  are  full  of  contra- 
dictions. The  globe  upon  which  we  live  presents  the 
first  great  contradiction.  It  has  no  under  or  upper 
side;  it  is  all  outside.  Go  around  it  from  east  to  west, 
or  from  north  to  south,  and  you  find  no  bottom  or 
top  such  as  you  see  on  the  globe  in  your  study,  or  as 
you  apparently  see  on  the  moon  and  the  sun  in  the 
heavens.  A  fly  at  the  South  Pole  of  the  schoolroom 
globe  is  in  a  reversed  position,  but  the  discoverers 
of  the  South  Pole  on  our  earth  did  not  find  them- 
selves in  a  reversed  position  on  their  arrival  there, 
or  in  danger  of  falling  off.  The  sphere  is  a  perpetual 
contradiction.  It  is  the  harmonization  of  opposites. 
Our  minds  are  adjusted  to  planes  and  to  right  lines, 
to  up  and  down,  to  over  and  under.  Our  action 
upon  things  is  linear.  Curves  and  circles  baffle  us. 
My  mind  cannot  adjust  itself  to  the  condition  of 
free  empty  space. 

Transport  yourself  in  imagination  away  from  the 
earth  to  the  vacancy  of  the  interstellar  regions.  Can 
you  convince  yourself  that  there  would  be  no  over 
and  no  under,  no  east  and  no  west,  no  north  and  no 
south?  Would  one  not  look  down  to  one's  feet,  and 
lift  one's  hand  to  one's  head?  What  could  one  do? 
—  no  horizontal,  no  vertical  —  just  the  negation  of 
all  motion  and  direction.  If  one  rode  upon  a  meteor- 
ite rushing  toward  the  earth,  would  one  have  the 

148 


"FATED  TO  BE  FREE" 

sensation  of  falling?  Could  one  have  any  sensation 
of  motion  at  all  in  absolutely  vacant  space  —  no 
matter  at  what  speed  with  reference  to  the  stars  one 
might  be  moving?  To  have  a  sense  of  motion  must 
we  not  have  also  a  sense  of  something  not  in  mo- 
tion? In  your  boat  on  the  river,  carried  by  the  tide 
or  the  current,  you  have  no  sense  of  motion  till  you 
look  shoreward.  With  your  eye  upon  the  water  all 
is  at  rest.  The  balloonist  floats  in  an  absolute  calm. 
The  wind  does  not  buffet  him  because  he  goes  with 
it.  But  he  looks  down  and  sees  objects  beneath 
him,  and  he  looks  up  and  sees  clouds  or  stars  above 
him.  Fancy  him  continuing  his  journey  on  into 
space  till  he  leaves  the  earth  behind  him  —  on  and  on 
till  the  earth  appears  like  another  moon.  Would 
he  look  up  or  down  to  see  it?  Would  he  have  a 
sense  of  rising  or  of  falling?  If  he  threw  out  ballast, 
would  it  drop  or  soar,  or  would  it  refuse  to  leave 
him? 

Such  speculations  show  how  relative  our  sense 
standards  are,  how  the  law  of  the  sphere  upon  which 
we  live  dominates  and  stamps  our  mental  concepts. 
Away  from  the  earth,  in  free  space,  and  we  are  lost; 
we  cannot  find  ourselves;  we  are  stripped  of  every- 
thing but  ourselves;  we  are  stripped  of  night  and 
day,  of  up  and  down,  of  east  and  west,  of  north  and 
south,  of  time  and  space,  of  motion  and  rest,  of 
weight  and  direction.  Just  what  our  predicament 
would  be,  who  can  fancy? 

149 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

The  belief  in  free  will  is  like  the  belief  that  the 
earth  is  a  plane  instead  of  a  sphere.  For  all  practi- 
cal purposes  the  earth  is  a  plane  —  a  plane  which 
has  no  boundaries;  and  for  all  practical  purposes  the 
will  is  free.  We  feel  at  liberty  to  do  what  we  like, 
to  go  here  or  to  stay  there,  to  vote  for  this  candidate 
or  to  vote  for  that.  We  live  our  lives  without  any 
sense  of  the  sphericity  of  the  globe,  and  without  any 
sense  that  our  power  of  choice  is  not  absolutely  free. 

But  it  is  as  easy  to  prove  that  the  will  is  not  free 
as  to  prove  that  the  earth  is  round.  In  the  realm  of 
material  things  fatalism  abounds.  Everything  is  held 
in  the  iron  law  of  cause  and  effect.  Only  life  is  spon- 
taneous. We  speak  justly  of  the  spontaneity  of  the 
great  poets,  of  the  great  orators,  of  our  own  best  acts, 
while  yet  we  do  not  take  into  account  the  subtle  and 
hidden  physical  forces  at  work.  The  flower  blooms 
spontaneously,  but  not  independently  of  the  long 
chain  of  forces  at  work  there  in  the  soil,  in  the  air, 
m  the  sun.  Heroic  deeds  and  poetic  thoughts  are 
spontaneous  in  the  same  sense.  Without  thought 
or  calculation  heroic  deeds  flash  out  in  the  lives  of 
men,  noble  thoughts  are  born  in  our  minds  and 
hearts,  as  spontaneous  as  the  rain  or  the  dew,  — 
and  no  more  so;  which  is  to  say  that  they  are  the 
result  of  an  intricate  complex  of  causes  at  work  in 
unison  with  the  creative  force  of  Life. 

Something  cannot  come  from  nothing.  Some 
force  in  the  man  impelled  him  to  the  heroic  act.  All 

150 


it 


FATED  TO  BE  FREE" 


that  had  gone  to  the  making  of  his  character  up  to 
that  hour  impelled  him  to  it.  Something  in  the  poet 
bloomed  or  flashed  out  in  his  lyrical  burst,  but  per- 
haps if  he  had  had  a  headache,  or  had  just  lost  a 
friend,  the  lyric  would  not  have  come. 

In  terms  of  science  every  effect  has  its  cause,  and 
there  is  no  life  except  from  antecedent  life.    Wlien 
we  fix  our  attention  upon  matter,  and  the  laws  of 
matter,  the  belief  in  free  will  is  impossible.   We  are 
in  the  land  of  fatalism.   We  are  not  here  by  our  own 
will.    We  are  not  of  this  type  or  family  or  race  by 
oiu-  own  will.    We  are  hardly  more  of  this  or  that 
political  or  religious  creed  by  our  own  will.   We  did 
not  choose  to  have  red  hair  or  black  hair,  blue  eyes 
or  gray  eyes.    We  have  no  power  of  choice  in  the 
main  things  of  our  lives  and  fortunes.  And  yet  to  us 
it  seems  that  our  wills  are  free.   When  we  appeal  to 
the  natural  scientific  order,  we  are  held  in  the  iron 
bonds  of  necessity  or  determinism.    The  natural 
order  is  inviolable.  The  river  is  free  to  flow  where 
gravity  directs  or  pulls  it,  or  rather,  where  its  in- 
herent mobility  allows  it  to  flow.   Each  thing  is  free 
to  obey  the  laws  of  its  o\\ti  nature,  which  means  it  is 
not  really  free  at  all.   "Free  as  the  air"  we  say,  but 
the  air  always  behaves  the  same  under  the  same 
conditions;  it  is  controlled  by  its  own  laws.    The 
wind  does  not  blow  where  it  listeth,  but  where  its 
laws  decree  that  it  shall  blow.    Human  nature  is 
free  in  the  same  way  —  a  vastly  more  complex 

151 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES^ 

affair  than  the  air,  yet  it  cannot  transcend  its  own 
limitations.  You  and  I  are  free  to  act  according  to 
our  natures,  modified  by  our  training  and  by  the 
times  in  which  we  Hve.  This  modification  is  not 
voluntary,  at  least  only  in  part.  Our  times,  our 
environment,  our  proclivities,  shape  us  insensibly 
and  involuntarily.   How,  then,  is  the  will  free.^^ 

A  scientific  analysis  shows  that  it  is  not  free 
when  looked  at  objectively,  but  free  when  looked 
at  subjectively.  We  do  not  ordinarily  feel  the  bonds 
of  our  own  natures.  In  the  moral  order  we  are 
free;  we  are  unconscious  of  restraint  or  control. 
In  our  own  thought  we  seem  to  do  what  we  like, 
though  what  we  like  has  been  determined  by  forces 
or  conditions  far  older  than  we  are.  What  we  like 
and  dislike  are  inherent  in  our  own  natures,  and 
with  our  own  natures  —  our  mental  and  spiritual 
constitutions  —  we  have  had  little  to  do.  With  our 
physical  natures  likewise  we  have  had  little  to  do, 
and  how  closely  our  mental  and  spiritual  make-ups 
are  dependent  upon  the  physical,  we  are  coming 
more  and  more  to  realize. 

We  like  a  fine  day  because  we  thrive  best  on  a 
fine  day,  but  all  fine  days  would  grow  monotonous, 
and  we  should  sigh  for  cloud  and  storm.  We  like 
kindness,  gentleness,  good  nature,  a  cheerful  spirit, 
because  these  things  are  conducive  to  our  well-being. 
We  prefer  truth  to  falsehood,  because  our  nature 
demands  it. 

152 


"FATED  TO  BE  FREE" 

We  are  not  free  in  the  physical  order;  how,  then, 
are  we  free  in  the  moral  order?  We  cannot  be  wise 
at  will,  or  always  choose  the  best  course,  or  always 
speak  the  right  word,  but  we  are  free  because  we 
feel  that  we  are  free.  We  have  moral  freedom.  We 
are  willing  to  be  held  responsible  for  the  choice  we 
make,  though  that  choice  be  in  reality  not  so  much 
a  matter  of  our  wills  as  a  matter  of  our  characters  — 
a  vague,  non-scientific  term  with  a  very  uncertain 
content. 

The  big  man  who  marries  the  little  woman,  and 
the  little  woman  who  accepts  the  big  man,  both  feel 
that  they  had  perfect  freedom  of  choice,  yet  is  it  not 
clear  that  there  is  a  law  in  such  matters?  In  fact, 
is  it  not  clear  that  most  marriages  are  complemen- 
tary, —  black  eyes  with  blue,  slowness  with  quick- 
ness, weakness  with  strength,  —  though  the  con- 
tracting parties  yielded,  as  it  seemed  to  them,  to  the 
utmost  freedom  of  choice?  Their  wills  were  free  — 
to  do  what  Nature  wanted  them  to  do.  Her  pur- 
pose was  deeper  than  theirs. 

A  man  is  free  to  elect  heaven  or  hell,  if  heaven  or 
hell  have  a  mortgage  upon  him.  But  if  it  have, 
he  never  will  know  it,  and  will  credit  himself  with 
absolute  power  of  choice.  Hence,  we  say  the  will 
is  free,  though  freedom  only  means  the  absence  of 
any  conscious  restraint. 

In  the  pride  of  our  wills  we  boast  that  we  are 
masters  of  our  fate,  and  so  we  are  in  a  very  limited 

153 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

sense.  In  a  large  way  human  history  is  under  the 
same  law  as  natural  history  or  biological  history;  is 
subject  to  the  same  haphazard,  hit-and-miss  proc- 
ess, the  same  waste,  delays,  failures.  The  only 
sure  thing  in  either  case  is  the  law  of  progress  — 
evolution  in  a  general  broadcast  way.  We  do  not 
know  that  the  great  historical  characters  appeared 
w^hen  most  needed.  When  they  did  appear,  they  did 
their  work,  filled  their  places,  but  how  many  epochs 
have  come  and  gone  without  their  redeemers  and 
leaders!  In  how  many  cases  the  great  leader  and 
savior  may  have  been  there,  though  conditions  and 
events  have  not  favored  his  appearance!  Grant 
would  have  died  unknown  had  not  events  brought 
him  out.  So  would  Washington  and  Lincoln  and 
Lee.   Opportunity  is  half  of  life. 

We  cannot  jump  off  the  sphere;  no  more  can  we 
free  ourselves  of  the  idea  of  a  final  cause.  This  idea 
of  causation  is  developed  in  us  by  our  experience  in 
life;  if  we  forget  it,  we  speedily  come  to  grief.  But 
it  does  not  help  us  in  dealing  with  the  final  mystery. 
We  can  find  no  end  to  the  causal  sequence.  We 
simply  rest  in  First  Cause. 

Two  opposites  may  make  a  whole.  There  is  often 
the  larger  truth  with  the  lesser  truth  inside  it.  The 
larger  truth  is  the  law  of  causation;  the  lesser  truth 
is  the  freedom  of  the  will.  Fate  is  true  and,  within 
limits,  freedom  of  choice  is  true.  If  my  tempera- 
ment, or   that  complex  of  forces  and  tendencies 

154 


(( 


FATED  TO  BE  FREE" 


which  I  call  my  disposition,  impels  me  to  act  thus 
and  not  otherwise,  if  my  Irish  blood,  or  my  Dutch 
blood,  or  my  English  blood,  if  my  maternal  or  my 
paternal  grandfather,  if  my  small  brain  or  my  large 
brain,  rule  the  destinies  of  my  life,  I  am  still  free, 
because  these  things  and  influences  are  my  very  self. 
They  are  not  something  external  which  lays  a  guid- 
ing and  restraining  hand  upon  me;  they  are  the  me. 
Hence,  with  the  utmost  sense  of  freedom  I  go  my 
way  in  life. 

Gravity  makes  the  stream  flow,  the  lay  of  the 
land  determines  its  course,  but  if  the  water  were 
conscious,  would  it  feel  that  it  did  not  flow  where  it 
had  a  mind  to?  It  has  a  mind  to  flow  where  gravity 
and  the  lay  of  the  land  permit  it  to  flow. 

The  joy  of  free  choice  is  in  us  all  because  the  forces 
that  choose  for  us  are  a  part  of  our  very  selves. 

In  choosing  our  way  of  life  we  are  controlled  by 
many  factors,  but  these  are  all  vital  in  our  char- 
acters. In  choosing  our  wives,  we  unconsciously 
choose  a  woman  who  is  mainly  complementary  to 
us,  and  yet,  she  is  the  choice  of  the  heart  —  the 
heart  chooses  in  obedience  to  this  law  of  nature; 
in  choosing  our  bosom  friends,  we  are  in  the  same 
way  guided  by  influences  we  wot  not  of.  In  choosing 
our  walk  in  life,  we  are  guided  by  our  talent,  our 
attractions,  and  the  like.  The  father  chooses  the 
profession  of  his  son  through  his  blood.  Our  con- 
stitutions play  a  part  in  all  we  do  or  think  or 

155 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

choose,  and  our  constitutions  are  complexes  of 
forces  that  date  from  the  past  as  much  as,  or  more 
than,  they  date  from  the  present. 

Determinism  is  only  a  name;  free  will  is  only  a 
name;  the  reality  is  our  joyful  and  conscious  obedi- 
ence to  the  promptings  of  our  own  natures.  That 
our  individual  natures  are  a  part  of  the  general  na- 
ture, and  subject  to  its  laws,  is  the  fact  above  all. 

At  times  we  are  conscious  of  struggling  against  a 
tendency  in  us,  but  this  struggle  also  has  its  natural 
history.  We  are  pulled  two  ways,  and  the  stronger 
pull  wins.   We  yield  to  it  because  it  is  the  strongest. 

Freedom  of  will  means  freedom  to  lift  the  arm,  to 
open  the  eyes,  to  close  the  mouth,  but  not  freedom 
to  lift  the  hair,  or  to  close  the  nose  or  the  ears,  or  to 
abolish  hunger,  or  any  of  the  other  things  we  might 
enumerate  as  against  nature.  All  the  little  but  fun- 
damental acts  of  our  lives,  all  the  movements  of  our 
bodies,  are  immediately  under  the  control  of  what 
we  call  our  wills.  But  the  movements  of  our  spirits, 
the  promptings  of  our  character,  our  temper,  our 
dispositions,  are  not  in  the  same  sense  under  the 
control  of  our  wills. 

Only  so  much  of  a  man  knows  itself  and  is  under 
the  control  of  the  conscious  will  as  is  necessary  to 
his  dealing  successfully  with  outward  things.  By 
far  the  larger  part  of  every  one  of  us  is  the  subcon- 
scious self.  The  body  runs  itself.  Our  minds  have 
but  little  to  say  about  it.  All  the  physical  functions 

156 


"FATED  TO  BE  FREE" 

are  so  important  that  they  could  not  be  left  to  the 
hazards  of  the  forgetful  and  sleep-indulging  niind. 
In  health  the  body  does  not  forget  to  breathe,  or  the 
heart  to  beat,  or  the  stomach  to  digest. 

in 

In  all  our  human  relations  and  enterprises  we  are 
no  doubt  under  the  influence  of  general,  impersonal 
laws  to  a  much  larger  extent  than  we  ever  suspect. 
Our  destinies  are  shaped  more  or  less  by  the  geogra- 
phy of  the  country,  by  its  geology,  by  its  climate. 
A  great  river,  a  great  lake,  the  coastline,  a  moim- 
tain-range  —  all  set  their  stamp  upon  our  lives.  We 
are  independent  of  our  environment  only  within 
very  narrow  limits.  The  mountains  beget  one  type 
of  character,  the  plains  another,  the  sea  another. 
These  influences  work  over  and  beyond  our  power 
of  choice.  Men  in  masses  and  tribes  are  subject  to 
influences  and  courses  of  action  that  the  individ- 
ual members  composing  them  are  exempt  from. 
There  is  a  rule  of  the  multitude,  and  a  rule  of  the  in- 
dividual. Men  collectively  will  be  guilty  of  deeds  and 
crimes  that  the  separate  units  would  not  stoop  to. 
In  a  crowd  we  escape  the  feeling  of  individual  re- 
sponsibility. In  mobs  man  reverts  to  more  primitive 
and  savage  conditions;  he  becomes  more  like  the 
irrational  forces  of  nature.  Is  there  any  ground 
of  hope  that  international  morality  will  ever  reach 
the  standard  of  individual  morality?  —  that    the 

157 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

nation  will  ever  be  as  unselfish  and  fair-minded  as 
the  individuals  composing  it?  The  experience  of 
most  of  us  with  individual  Germans  has  been  of  the 
most  satisfactory  kind — an  honest,  sober-minded, 
fair-dealing,  humane  people  is  our  verdict;  but  the 
nation  embattled  and  fired  with  the  thirst  of  con- 
quest and  in  the  grip  of  a  military  despotism,  re- 
verts to  the  temper  of  the  original  Hun:  the  atroc- 
ities their  government  and  armies  are  guilty  of 
shock  mankind.  The  history  of  all  other  nations 
shows  similar  contrasts,  but  not,  in  our  time,  to  the 
same  degree. 

The  streams  and  rivers  all  find  their  way  to  the 
sea;  the  conditions  and  influences  that  shape  their 
courses  are  few  and  constant;  but  once  they  are 
united  in  the  ocean,  a  new  set  of  influences  is  called 
into  play:  the  tides  appear  and  the  vast  ocean  cur- 
rents begin  to  flow  and  modify  the  climates  of  the 
globe.  The  laws  of  water  are  not  changed,  but  new 
laws  or  forces,  that  have  their  sources  beyond  the 
earth,  at  once  begin  to  operate.  An  application, 
not  too  precise  and  literal,  of  this  fact  to  the  na- 
tions of  the  earth  may  throw  some  light  upon  their 
behavior. 


X 

SCIENTIFIC  FAITH  ONCE  MORE 

I 

SCIENTIFIC  faith  is  no  more  smooth  sailing 
than  is  theological  faith.  One  involves  about 
as  many  mysteries,  as  many  unthinkable  truths,  as 
the  other.  It  is  unthinkable  that  a  particle  of  mat- 
ter can  be  so  small  that  it  cannot  be  made  smaller, 
yet  the  atomic  theory  of  matter  involves  this  con- 
tradiction. The  luminiferous  ether,  the  most  dense 
and  at  the  same  time  the  most  attenuated  body  in 
the  universe,  which  science  has  invented  to  account 
for  the  action  of  bodies  upon  other  bodies  at  a  dis- 
tance, is  unthinkable;  but  with  all  the  contradic- 
tions which  it  involves,  we  are  compelled  to  assume 
its  reality  in  order  to  account  for  things  as  we  know 
them. 

How  many  things  may  be  affirmed  of  the  visible, 
ponderable  bodies  on  the  earth's  surface  which  are 
just  the  opposite  of  what  is  true  of  the  invisible,  im- 
ponderable bodies  of  the  interior  world  of  matter, 
and  which  also  do  not  hold  among  the  bodies  of 
celestial  space!  Thus  all  inanimate  bodies  on  the 
earth's  surface  are  at  rest  until  some  force  exterior 
to  themselves  acts  upon  them.   In  the  world  of 

159 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

molecular  physics  the  molecules  and  atoms  and 
electrons  are  self -moved,  and  are  in  perpetual  mo- 
tion.    If  the   Brunonian   movement   extended   to 
visible  ponderable  bodies,  the  earth  would  be  un- 
inhabitable; we  should  behold  a  sight  such  as  we 
have  never  yet  beheld.    Spontaneous  motion  never 
takes  place  among  inanimate  bodies,  while  it  is  the 
rule  among  the  atoms  of  which  they  are  composed. 
Gravity  and  friction  bind  the  bodies  on  the  surface 
of  the  earth,  but  these  laws  are  inoperative  in  the 
world  of  atoms  and  electrons.   On  the  other  hand, 
when  we  reach  the  astronomic  world,  or  the  sidereal 
universe,  we  find  the  same  condition  that  prevails  in 
the  world  of  the  infinitely  little:  perpetual  motion 
goes  on,  friction  is  abolished,  and  nothing  is  at  rest; 
there  are  collisions  and  disruptions  just  as  there  are 
in  the  world  of  atoms.  Height  and  depth,  upper  and 
under,  east  and  west,  north  and  south,  weight  and 
inertia,  as  we    experience    them,  have    vanished. 
There  are  no  boundaries,  no  ending  and  no  begin- 
ning, no  centre  and  no  circumference;  the  infinite 
cannot  have  any  of  these.  Rest  and  motion  are  rela- 
tive terms.   The  sun  is  at  rest  with  reference  to  the 
earth,  but  in  motion  with  reference  to  some  larger 
system,  which  is  again  at  rest  when  tried  by  the  sun. 
Motion  implies  something  which  is  not  in  motion. 
The  bodies  we  know  have  weight  with  reference 
to  the  earth,  as  the  earth  has  with  reference  to 
some  larger  body,  and  this  again  with  reference  to 

160 


SCIENTIFIC  FAITH  ONCE  MORE 

some  other  still  larger,  and  so  on;  but  the  universe 
as  a  whole  can  have  no  weight.  A  body  at  the  centre 
of  the  earth  can  have  no  weight.  If  unsupported, 
would  it  move  up  or  down?  The  infinitely  little 
and  infinitely  vast  alike  baffle  the  understanding, 
developed  as  it  is  by  our  concrete  finite  life.  Crea- 
tion is  typified  by  the  sphere.  A  circle  is  a  straight 
line  that  at  every  point  ceases  to  be  a  straight  line, 
and  the  earth's  surface  is  a  plane  that  every  moment 
ceases  to  be  a  plane.  Following  the  surface  of  the 
earth  does  not  carry  us  to  the  under  side,  because 
there  is  no  more  an  under  side  than  there  is  an  upper 
side  —  there  is  only  a  boundless  surface.  But  if  it 
were  possible  for  us  to  build  a  globe  upon  the  earth 
of  any  conceivable  dimensions  would  it  not  have  an 
upper  and  an  under  side? 

n 

The  mysteries  of  religion  are  of  a  different  order 
from  those  of  science;  they  are  parts  of  an  arbitrary 
system  of  man's  own  creation;  they  contradict  our 
reason  and  our  experience,  while  the  mysteries  of 
science  are  revealed  by  our  reason,  and  transcend 
our  experience.  One  implies  the  supernatural,  while 
the  other  implies  inscrutable  processes  or  forces  in 
the  natural.  That  man  is  of  animal  origin  is  a  de- 
duction of  reason,  but  the  fact  so  far  transcends  our 
experience  that  it  puts  a  great  strain  upon  our 
scientific  faith. 

161 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

The  miracles  of  our  theology  do  violence  to  our 
understanding,  but  it  is  a  part  of  our  faith  to  accept 
them.  The  miracle  of  the  loaves  and  the  fishes,  and  of 
the  turning  of  water  into  wine,  have  their  parallels  in 
chemical  reactions,  as  in  the  conversion  of  starch  into 
sugar,  or  of  sugar  into  an  acid;  the  mystery  is  that 
of  chemical  transformations,  and  occurs  in  the  every- 
day processes  of  nature,  while  the  biblical  miracles 
are  exceptional  occurrences,  and  are  never  repeated. 

The  miracles  of  religion  are  to  be  discredited,  not 
because  we  cannot  conceive  of  them,  but  because 
they  run  counter  to  all  the  rest  of  our  knowledge; 
while  the  mysteries  of  science,  such  as  chemical 
affinity,  the  conservation  of  energy,  the  indivisibil- 
ity of  the  atom,  the  change  of  the  non-living  into 
the  living,  and  the  like,  extend  the  boundaries  of 
our  knowledge,  though  the  modus  operandi  of  these 
changes  remains  hidden. 

We  do  not  know  how  the  food  we  eat  is  trans- 
formed into  the  thoughts  we  think;  in  other  words, 
the  connection  of  the  physical  with  the  mental 
baffles  us;  but  our  familiarity  with  the  phenomena 
causes  us  to  look  upon  them  as  a  matter  of  course.  In 
fact,  while  most  of  the  mysteries  and  marvels  of  the 
prescientific  ages  only  served  to  measure  the  depth 
of  the  mental  darkness  of  those  ages,  the  mysteries 
and  the  marvels  of  modern  science  serve  to  measure 
the  depths  to  which  we  have  penetrated  into  the 
hidden  processes  of  natural  law. 

162 


SCIENTIFIC  FAITH  ONCE  MORE 

The  scientific  faith  which  triumphs  over  all 
o])stacles  is  not  common.  The  hite  Alfred  Russel 
\\'allace  was  an  eminent  scientist  and  naturalist,  co- 
kborerwith  Darwin  in  sustaining  the  theory  of  the 
origin  of  species  by  natural  selection;  but  he  could 
not  accept  the  whole  of  Darwinism.  The  break  in 
his  scientific  faith  is  seen  in  his  failure  to  accept  com- 
pletely the  animal  origin  of  man;  he  looked  upon 
man's  spiritual  nature  as  a  miraculous  addition  to 
his  animal  inheritance.  Natural  science  owes  a 
great  debt  to  Agassiz,  but  he,  too,  faltered  before 
the  problem  of  the  origin  of  species  through  natural 
descent.  He  belonged  to  an  age  that  had  not  fully 
emancipated  itself  from  the  dogmas  of  the  church. 
He  saw  an  incarnated  thought  of  the  Creator  in 
every  species  of  animal  and  plant.  The  great  major- 
ity of  mankind  still  see  a  dualist  world  —  half  nat- 
ural and  half  supernatural.  But  the  strict  scientist 
knows  only  the  natural.  Even  the  origin  of  life  is 
to  him  only  a  problem  of  the  inherent  potency  of 
matter. 

Darwin's  scientific  faith  was  not  quite  able  to 
stand  alone;  it  had  to  lean  upon  teleological  j)rops. 
He  could  not  accept  the  whole  proposition  of  the 
natural  origin  of  man  and  of  other  forms  of  life;  his 
theory  of  descent  had  to  start  with  a  few  forms, 
animal  and  vegetable,  three  or  four,  miraculously 
brought  into  the  world  by  the  creative  power  of  rtn 
omnipotent  being;  these  few  original  forms,  through 

163 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

the  action  of  natural  selection,  working  upon  chance 
variation,  gave  rise  to  all  the  infinite  diversity  of 
forms  that  now  people  the  earth.  Darwin's  scientific 
faith  was  strong  where  that  of  Wallace  was  weak, 
inasmuch  as  he  had  no  more  difficulty  in  accounting 
for  the  mind  of  man  by  the  theory  of  descent,  than 
he  had  in  accounting  for  the  body  of  man.  Both 
were  an  evolution  of  lower  forms.  His  was  a  type 
of  mind  much  more  steady  and  consistent  than  was 
the  mind  of  Wallace.  Darwin's  mind  was  of  the 
planetary  order,  while  Wallace's  was  more  cometary. 
The  later  works  of  Wallace  are  a  curious  mixture  of 
scientific  data  and  theological  moonshine. 

Darwin's  conviction  of  the  origin  of  species 
through  descent  was  so  deep  and  whole-hearted 
that  one  wonders  why  it  did  not  carry  him  back  into 
the  problem  of  the  very  beginning  of  life  upon  the 
globe.  If  natural  law  is  adequate  to  account  for  the 
wonderful  diversity  of  vegetable  and  animal  forms, 
including  the  body  and  the  soul  of  man,  why  should 
it  not  be  adequate  to  account  for  the  origin  of  the 
first  primordial  forms?  If  we  are  to  believe  that  the 
mentality  and  spirituality  of  man  as  we  know  him 
to-day  could  arise  from  the  blind,  unreasoning  lower 
orders,  should  we  have  any  trouble  in  believing  that 
living  matter  could  arise  or  be  evolved  from  the  non- 
living? The  change  is  no  greater  in  the  latter  case 
than  in  the  former. 

Are  we  to  look  upon  the  universe  as  half  natural 

164 


SCIENTIFIC  FAITH  ONCE  MORE 

and  half  supernatural?  Must  it  not  be  entirely  one 
or  the  other  to  be  a  universe?  Is  it  any  easier  to 
believe  that  God  planted  the  germs  of  evolution  in  a 
few  forms,  created  out  of  hand,  so  to  speak,  than  it 
is  to  believe  that  He  kindled  the  evolutionary  im- 
pulse in  matter  itself?  If  we  believe  that  one  species 
was  brought  into  being  by  a  special  act  of  creative 
energy,  are  we  not  bound  to  believe  that  all  species 
were?  It  is  the  old  story  of  our  fathers:  that  the 
Creator  is  active  in  nature  at  certain  times  and 
places,  and  is  passive  at  others.  The  processes  of 
creation  being  miraculously  started,  they  then  con- 
tinue under  the  guidance  of  natural  law. 

This  break  in  Darwin's  scientific  faith  does  not  at 
all  detract  from  the  immense  value  of  his  work.  I 
only  point  to  it  as  showing  how  difficult  it  was  for 
even  his  mind  to  commit  itself  unreservedlv  to  the 
full  guidance  of  natural  science.  Tyndall,  whose 
scientific  faith  was  more  consistent,  saw  the  "prom- 
ise and  the  potency"  of  all  terrestrial  life  in  matter 
itself,  but  he  wrote  matter  with  a  big  M,  and  de- 
clared that  at  bottom  it  was  essentially  mysterious 
and  transcendental;  and  Bruno,  in  declaring  that 
matter  was  the  mother  of  us  all,  brought  the  Crea- 
tor near  us  in  the  same  way.  Such  views  simply 
show  the  creative  energy  as  always  immanent  in  the 
universe.  They  free  our  minds  of  the  notion  that 
creation  is  a  miracle  at  one  end,  and  ordinary  devel- 
opment at  the  other;  that  a  primary  cause  sets  the 

165 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

machine  going,  then  turns  it  over  to  secondary 
causes.  How  is  it  possible  to  conceive  of  so-called 
secondary  causes,  except  as  phases  of  the  First 
Cause?  When  we  use  the  phrase,  the  idea  of  dele- 
gated power,  drawn  from  our  civic  experience,  seems 
to  be  in  our  minds.  But  I  doubt  if  the  universe  is 
run  on  this  plan,  though  our  ecclesiasticism  has  made 
much  of  this  idea.  Our  idea  of  cause,  anyhow,  is 
drawn  entirely  from  our  experience  with  material 
bodies  and  forces.  In  living  nature,  and  in  the 
brain  of  man,  cause  and  effect  meet  and  become  one. 
There  is  no  up  and  no  down,  no  east  and  no  west,  no 
north  and  no  south,  in  the  depths  of  sidereal  space; 
neither  do  any  other  of  our  mundane  notions  of 
primary  and  secondary  causes  apply  to  the  universe 
as  a  whole. 

The  rain  causes  the  grass  to  grow,  and  the  sun 
causes  the  snow  to  melt,  but  we  cannot  apply  the 
idea  of  cause,  in  this  sense,  to  nature  as  a  whole,  but 
only  to  parts  of  nature.  Gravitation  caused  New- 
ton's apple  to  fall,  but  what  causes  the  earth  to  fall 
forever  and  ever,  and  never  to  fall  upon  the  body 
that  is  said  to  attract  it? 

Huxley's  scientific  faith  was  more  radical  and  un- 
compromising than  Darwin's.  It  never  went  into 
partnership  with  the  old  teleological  notions  of  cre- 
ation. Huxley  not  only  accepted  the  development 
theory,  with  all  that  it  implies,  but,  so  far  as  I  can 
make  out,  he  accepted  the  theory  of  the  physico- 

166 


SCIENTIFIC  FAITH  ONCE  MORE 

chemical  origin  of  life  itself.  He  found  no  more 
place  for  miracle  at  the  beginning  than  at  the  end  of 
evolution,  yet  he  repudiated  materialism  as  emphat- 
ically as  he  rejected  what  he  calls  spiritualism,  — 
declaring  that  the  latter  was  only  the  former  turned 
bottom-side  up.  While  recognizing  that  "the  logical 
methods  of  physical  science  are  of  universal  applica- 
bility," he  saw  clearly  enough  that  many  subjects 
of  thought  and  emotion  —  doubtless  he  would  say, 
many  forms  of  truth  —  lie  entirely  outside  the  prov- 
ince of  physical  science.  He  recognized  three  forms 
of  reality  in  the  universe,  —  matter,  energy,  and 
consciousness,  —  and  that  the  last-named  was  no 
conceivable  modification  of  either  of  the  others. 
Whether  he  assigned  to  consciousness  the  same  cos- 
mic rank  as  to  matter  and  energy,  does  not  appear. 
It  is  quite  certain  that  matter  and  energy  existed 
before  consciousness  appeared,  and  will  continue  to 
exist  after  it  disappears.  But,  in  making  this  state- 
ment, are  we  projecting  our  consciousness  into  the 
past,  and  into  the  future? 

I  note  one  weakness  in  Huxley's  faith:  it  seems  to 
have  balked  at  accepting  the  reality  of  things  it 
could  not  conceive  of.  While  looking  upon  the  the- 
ory of  the  atomic  constitution  of  matter  as  a  valua- 
ble working  hypothesis,  it  balked  at  the  objective 
existence  of  the  atom,  —  a  point  of  matter  which 
occupied  space  and  had  form  and  weight,  and  yet 
was  indivisible.     This  was  beyond  his  power  of 

167 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

conception,  as  it  is  beyond  the  power  of  conception 
of  the  best  of  us.  Yet  we  have  to  accept  the  atom 
on  the  demonstrations  of  experimental  science.  The 
hehum  atom  has  been  proved  to  be  an  objective 
entity  as  truly  as  is  the  sun  in  heaven.  The  apparent 
contradiction  of  an  indivisible  body  is  mvolved  in 
our  habits  of  thought  formed  by  our  dealings  with 
ponderable  bodies;  we  are  introduced  to  the  world 
of  chemical  reactions.  We  cannot  conceive  or  pic- 
ture to  ourselves  just  what  takes  place  when  two 
gases  unite  chemically,  as  when  hydrogen  and  oxy- 
gen unite  to  form  water.  Our  only  resource  is  to 
apply  to  the  process  mechanical  images;  our  experi- 
ence affords  us  no  other. 

We  fancy  that  the  difference  between  two  com- 
pounds with  the  same  chemical  formula,  but  with 
widely  different  properties,  —  say  alcohol  and 
ether,  —  consists  in  the  different  arrangement  of  the 
particles.  Arranged  in  one  order,  they  produce  one 
compound;  arranged  in  a  different  order,  they  result 
in  a  compound  with  different  properties.  Yet  every 
particle  of  these  gases  is  supposed  to  be  exactly  like 
every  other  particle.  How  hard,  then,  to  conceive  of 
any  mere  spatial  arrangement  of  them  as  resulting 
in  such  widely  different  products.  One  has  to  think 
of  each  atom  or  electron  as  a  little  world  in  itself, 
containing  different  stores  of  energy  or  vibrating  at 
a  different  rate  of  speed,  in  order  to  see  substances 
of  such  different  properties  arising  out  of  the  differ- 

168 


SCIENTIFIC  FAITH  ONCE  MORE 

ent  orders  in  which  the  atoms  are  arranged  in  the 
molecule,  and  the  molecules  in  the  mass.  If  the 
atoms  of  carbon  or  oxygen  or  hydrogen  are  each  as 
unique  and  individual  as  men  and  women  are,  one 
can  see  that  the  order  in  which  they  join  hands  or 
select  their  partners  may  be  fraught  with  important 
consequences.  Or  if  the  atoms  are  vibrating  each 
with  a  different  degree  of  energy,  or  carry  dill'erent 
charges  of  electricity,  then  one  can  see  that  the  dif- 
ferent orders  in  which  they  stand  to  each  other  would 
be  significant.  But  no  mechanical  image,  nor  the 
action  and  interaction  of  ponderable  bodies  in  time 
and  space,  afford  us  a  key  to  chemical  combination. 
How  can  we  figure  to  ourselves  any  sort  of  spatial 
disposition  of  the  ultimate  particles  of  the  invisible 
gases  of  oxygen  and  hydrogen  that  shall  result  in  a 
product  so  unlike  either  as  water?  How  impossible 
it  all  is  in  the  light  of  our  experience  with  visible 
bodies!  Each  atom  or  electron  seems  to  get  inside 
the  other.  But  how  can  an  indivisible  particle  of 
matter  have  either  an  inside  or  an  outside,  or  place, 
or  weight,  or  any  other  property  that  we  ascribe  to 
the  bodies  that  we  see  and  feel.^  What  a  world  of 
the  imagination  it  all  is !  It  introduces  us  to  some  of 
the  unthinkable  truths  of  science  —  truths  beyond 
our  power  to  grasp,  yet  which  experinKMital  science 
verifies.  It  is  unthinkable  that  matter  and  motion 
can  exist  without  friction;  that  two  bodies  can  occu- 
py the  same  space  at  the  same  time;  that  a  particle 

169 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

can  be  so  small  that  it  might  not  be  smaller,  or  so 
large  that  it  might  not  be  larger;  that  space  is  with- 
out limits,  creation  without  beginning;  that  at  the 
centre  of  the  earth  there  is  no  up  and  no  down,  on 
its  surface  no  under  and  no  over.    Two  waves  of 
sound  may  interfere  with  each  other  and  produce  a 
silence,  and  two  waves  of  light  produce  a  darkness. 
Molecular  physics  has  made  great  strides  since 
Huxley's  time.   With  all  the  phenomena  of  electric- 
ity before  him,  he  could  not  conceive  of  electricity 
as  a  positive  entity;  he  seems  to  have  regarded  it 
as 'only  a  mode  of  motion,  like  heat.    How  shall  we 
think  of  dematerialized  substance,  of  disembodied 
energy,  of   a   fluid   as   elusive   and   ubiquitous   as 
thought  itself,  or  of  the  transformation  of  one  form 
of  energy  into  another,  as  of  electrical  energy  into 
mechanical.?    Electricity  disappears  in  matter  be- 
yond the  reach  of  any  analysis  to  reveal;  it  is  sum- 
moned again  from  matter  as  by  the  wave  of  a  wand. 
In  a  thunderstorm  we  see  it  rend  the  heavens  and 
disappear  again  into  its  impossible  lair  as  quick  as 
thought  —  energy  which   is  not   energy.    Yet  we 
know  the  reality  of  all  these  things,  and  the  atomic 
theory  of  electricity  is  securely  established.    This 
gross  matter  with  which  life  struggles,  and  which  we 
conceive  of  as  at  enmity  with  spirit,  is  far  more 
wonderful  stuff  than  we  have  ever  dreamed  of,  and 
the  step  from  the  clod  to  the  brain  of  man  is  not  so 
impossible  as  it  seems.    There  is  deep  beneath  deep 

170 


SCIENTIFIC  FAITH  ONCE  MORE 

all  around  us.  Gross  matter  has  its  interior  in  the 
molecule;  the  molecule  has  its  interior  in  the  atom; 
the  atom  has  its  interior  in  the  electron;  and  the 
electron  is  matter  in  its  fourth  or  its  ethereal  estate. 
We  easily  conceive  of  matter  in  the  three  states,  — 
the  solid,  the  liquid,  the  gaseous,  —  because  experi- 
ence is  our  guide;  but  how  are  we  to  figure  to  our- 
selves matter  in  the  ethereal  estate?  In  other  words, 
how  are  we  to  grasp  the  electric  constitution  of 
matter? 

Ill 

In  Sir  Oliver  Lodge  we  have  an  example  of  a  thor- 
oughly trained  and  equipped  scientific  mind  which 
yet,  to  account  for  things  as  we  find  them  in  this 
world,  has  to  postulate  another  world  of  a  different 
order  —  the  world  of  spiritual  reality  —  interpene- 
trating and  interacting  with  the  visible  and  tangible 
world  about  us.  In  doing  this,  Sir  Oliver  takes  an 
extra-scientific  step  and  lays  himself  open  to  the 
same  criticism  that  has  been  visited  upon  Alfred 
Russel  Wallace. 

Our  Professor  Loeb  would  account  for  all  our  gods 
through  physical  and  chemical  changes  in  matter, 
and  would  probably  look  as  much  askance  upon 
Huxley's  "consciousness"  as  belonging  to  the  trin- 
ity of  cosmic  realities,  as  upon  Sir  Oliver  Lodge's 
hierarchy  of  spirits.  Huxley's  coat  of  mail  is  his 
agnosticism:  he  does  not  know,  and  sees  no  way  of 

171 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

knowing,  the  truth  of  many  things  about  which 
some  of  his  fellows  are  so  certain. 

Haeckel's  faith  is  so  robust  that  he  has  no  trouble 
in  seeing  life  arise  from  lifeless  matter  by  easy  nat- 
ural processes.  But  it  is  extraordinary  matter  that 
he  starts  with  —  unorganized  matter  charged  with 
such  potency  that  it  goes  forward  from  step  to  step 
up  the  ladder,  from  compound  to  compound,  each 
step  a  nearer  approach  to  life,  till  what  he  names 
the  moneray  an  organism  without  organs,  is  reached, 
then  organized  protoplasm,  then  the  cell,  then  the 
functioning  organism.  The  first  bit  of  unicellular 
life  is  charged  with  such  possibilities  of  development 
that  the  whole  world  of  living  things  lies  folded  in  it : 
man  and  all  that  lies  below  him,  all  the  orders  and 
suborders  and  species  of  the  animal  and  vegetable 
kingdoms,  are  latent  in  the  first  bit  of  life-stuff  that 
Haeckel  invokes  by  the  magic  of  words  from  inert 
matter. 

For  his  start  Haeckel  goes  back  to  the  first  harden- 
ing of  the  earth's  crust,  the  formation  of  water  in  a 
fluid  condition,  and  great  changes  in  the  carbonic- 
laden  atmosphere.  Under  these  conditions  a  series 
of  complicated  nitrogenous  carbon  compounds  was 
formed,  and  these  first  produced  albumen  or  protein. 
The  molecules  of  albumen  arranged  themselves  in  a 
certain  way,  according  to  their  unstable  chemical 
attractions,  in  larger  groups  of  molecules;  and  these 
combined  to  form  still  larger  aggregates,  and  thus 

172 


SCIENTIFIC  FAITH  ONCE  MORE 

produced  homogeneous  plasma-granules.  As  these 
grew  they  divided,  to  form  still  hirgcr  plasma-gran- 
ules of  a  homogeneous  character,  and  the  result  is 
what  he  calls  the  monera,  —  the  first  bit  of  hving 
unorganized  matter,  a  cell  without  nuclei. 

Out  of  this  moneray  by  surface  strain  and  chemi- 
cal differentiation  and  other  obscure  processes,  that 
wonder,  the  nuclear  cell,  arose  —  the  architect  of  all 
living  things  on  the  globe.  Our  bodies,  and  the  bod- 
ies of  all  other  living  beings,  are  simply  multipli- 
cations of  cells,  all  fundamentally  the  same,  —  the 
work  of  a  complex  microscopic  mechanism  that  seems 
to  know  from  the  start  the  part  it  is  to  play  in  the 
world,  and  proceeds  to  build  all  the  diversities  of 
living  forms  that  we  know;  but  why,  in  the  one  case, 
it  builds  a  flea,  or  a  cat,  or  a  monkey,  or  a  man,  and 
in  another  a  flower,  or  a  pine,  or  an  oak,  Haeckel's 
exposition  does  not  help  us  to  understand. 

Do  we  know  of  anything  in  the  laws  of  matter  and 
force,  as  we  see  them  in  the  non-living  world,  that 
would  lead  us  to  expect  such  novel  results?  Wiy 
the  cell  should  build  anything,  since  the  colony  of 
living  cells  that  Dr.  Carrel  has  kept  going  for  a 
year  or  more  builds  nothing,  but  only  multiplies  its 
units,  is  a  question  which  Haeckel's  chemistry  and 
physics  will  never  be  able  to  answer. 

*'The  organs  of  a  living  body,"  he  says,  "perform 
their  functions  chiefly  by  virtue  of  their  choniical 
composition."  Undoubtedly,  but  what  made  it  a 

173 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

living  body  and  gave  it  organs?  Of  course  the  func- 
tioning of  any  bodily  organ  involves  chemical  proc- 
esses, but  do  the  processes  determine  the  function? 
Do  they  assign  one  function  to  the  liver,  another  to 
the  kidneys,  another  to  the  heart?  In  other  words,  is 
the  organizing  effort  that  awakens  in  matter  the 
result  of  chemistry  and  physics? 

Do  we  not  need  to  go  outside  of  the  material  con- 
stituents of  a  living  body  to  account  for  its  purpo- 
sive organization?  Can  we  deduce  an  eye  or  an  ear 
or  a  brain  from  any  of  the  known  chemical  proper- 
ties or  their  material  elements?  Does  any  living 
thing  necessarily  follow  from  its  known  chemical 
composition?  Do  the  material  constituents  of  the 
different  parts  of  a  machine  determine  the  purpose 
and  function  of  that  machine?  The  function  of  an 
organ  and  the  organ  itself  are  the  result  of  some  un- 
known but  intelligent  power  in  the  body  as  a  whole. 

I  have  no  purpose  to  discredit  Haeckel's  science 
or  his  philosophy,  but  only  to  show  how  great  is  his 
scientific  faith,  —  how  much  it  presupposes,  and 
what  a  burden  it  throws  upon  chemistry  and  phys- 
ics. Like  all  the  later  philosophical  biologists,  he 
reaches  a  point  in  his  argument  when  chemistry  and 
physics  become  creative,  while  he  fails  to  see  that 
they  differ  at  all  in  their  activities  from  the  chemis- 
try and  physics  of  inorganic  matter.  To  be  consist- 
ent he  is  forced  to  believe  in  the  possibility  of  the 
artificial  production  of  life.  He  helps  himseff  out  by 

174 


SCIENTIFIC  FAITH  ONCE  MORE 

endowing  all  matter  with  sensation  and  i)urpose, 
and  thus  its  passage  from  one  condition  to  another 
higher  in  the  scale  is  easily  accomplished. 

Haeckel's  manipulation  of  matter  to  get  life  will 
to  many  persons  seem  like  a  sleight-of-hand  trick. 
One  thing  disappears,  and  at  a  w^ord  another  entirely 
different  takes  its  place.  Now  we  see  the  solid  life- 
less crust  of  the  earth,  then  we  see  water  and  carbon 
dioxide,  then  nitrogenous  carbon  compounds,  then, 
presto!  we  have  albumen  or  protoplasm,  the  physi- 
cal basis  of  life.  Out  of  protoplasm  by  a  deft  use  of 
words  comes  the  monera  ;  another  flourish  of  his  pen 
and  there  is  that  marvel,  the  living  cell,  with  its 
nucleus,  its  chromosome,  its  centrosome,  and  all  its 
complicated,  intelligent,  and  self-directed  activities. 
This  may  be  the  road  the  creative  energy  traveled, 
since  we  have  to  have  creative  energy  whether  in 
matter  or  apart  from  it;  but  our  scientific  faith  hesi- 
tates until  these  steps  can  be  repeated  in  the  lab- 
oratory and  life  appear  at  the  behest  of  chemical 
reactions. 

The  scientific  faith  of  mankind  —  faith  in  the  uni- 
versality of  natural  causation  —  is  greatly  on  the 
increase;  it  is  waxing  in  proportion  as  theological 
faith  is  waning;  and  if  love  of  truth  is  to  be  our  form 
of  love  of  God,  and  if  the  conservation  of  human  life 
and  the  amelioration  of  its  conditions  are  to  be  our 
form  of  brotherly  love,  then  the  religion  of  a  scien- 
tific age  certainly  has  some  redeeming  features. 


XI 

LITERATURE  AND  SCIENCE 

I 

IT  is  not  in  the  act  of  seeing  things  or  apprehend- 
ing facts  that  we  differ  so  much  from  one  an- 
other, as  in  the  act  of  interpreting  what  we  see  or 
apprehend.  Interpretation  opens  the  door  to  the 
play  of  temperament  and  imagination,  and  to  the 
bias  of  personahty,  and  is  therefore  within  the 
sphere  of  hterature.  A  mind  that  has  a  Uvely  fancy 
and  a  sense  of  mystery  will  interpret  phenomena 
quite  differently  from  a  mind  in  which  these  things 
are  absent.  The  poetic,  the  religious,  the  ethical 
mind  will  never  be  satisfied  with  the  interpretation 
of  the  physical  universe  given  us  by  the  scientific 
mind.  To  these  mental  types  such  an  interpreta- 
tion seems  hard  and  barren;  it  leaves  a  large  part  of 
our  human  nature  unsatisfied.  If  a  man  of  science 
were  to  explain  to  a  mother  all  the  physical  proper- 
ties, functions,  and  powers  of  her  baby,  and  all  its 
natural  history,  would  the  mother  see  her  baby  in 
such  a  portraiture.^  Would  he  have  told  her  why 
she  loves  it?  It  is  the  province  of  literature  and  art 
to  tell  her  why  she  loves  it,  and  to  make  her  love  it 
more;  of  science,  to  tell  her  how  she  came  by  it,  and 

176 


LITERATURE  AND  SCIENCE 

how  to  secure  its  physical  well-being.  Literature 
interprets  life  and  nature  in  terms  of  our  sentiments 
and  emotions;  science  interprets  them  in  terms  of 
our  understanding. 

The  habit  of  mind  begotten  by  the  contemplation 
of  Nature,  and  by  our  emotional  intercourse  with 
her,  is  in  many  ways  at  enmity  with  the  habit  of 
mind  begotten  by  the  scientific  study  of  Nature. 
The  former  has  given  us  literature,  art,  religion ;  out 
of  the  latter  has  come  our  material  civilization.  Out 
of  it  has  also  come  our  enlarged  conception  of  the 
physical  universe,  and  a  true  insight  as  to  our  re- 
lations with  it,  albeit  this  gain  seems  to  have 
been  purchased,  more  or  less,  at  the  expense  of  that 
state  of  mind  that  in  the  past  has  given  us  the  great 
poets  and  prophets  and  religious  teachers  and  in- 
spirers. 

The  saying  of  Coleridge,  that  the  real  antithesis 
to  poetry  is  not  prose  but  science,  is  of  permanent 
value.  When  we  look  upon  nature  and  life  as  the 
poet  does,  or  as  does  an  emotional,  imaginative 
being,  we  see  quite  a  different  world  from  the  one 
we  see  when,  armed  with  chemistry  and  physics, 
we  go  forth  to  analyze  it  and  appraise  it  in  teruLs  of 
exact  knowledge.  Science  is  cold  and  calculating, 
and  can  only  deal  with  verifiable  fact.  And  by  far 
the  larger  part  of  nature  and  of  life  is  unverifiablo, 
and  therefore  beyond  the  province  of  science.  Sci- 
ence strips  Nature  to  her  bare  bones;  literature  and 

177 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

philosophy  clothe  the  bones  with  something  analo- 
gous to  flesh  and  blood  and  warmth  and  color. 

The  sensitive,  imaginative  mind  cares  only  for 
that  scientific  truth  which  points  to  something 
beyond  science  —  to  large,  ideal  views.  Unless  sci- 
ence makes  the  world  more  alive  and  significant 
to  such  a  mind,  unless  its  truths  have  ideal  values 
and  can  in  some  measure  be  made  into  the  bread  of 
literature,  it  does  not  permanently  interest  it.  The 
hard,  literal  facts  of  physical  science,  unless  one  can 
synthesize  them  and  thus  in  a  measure  escape 
from  them,  are  barren  and  tasteless  to  the  artistic 
mind. 

In  the  great  sciences,  like  astronomy  and  geology, 
one  gets  wholes;  the  imagination  has  play-room. 
The  cosmic  laws  launch  him  upon  a  shoreless  sea. 
One  is  blown  upon  by  a  breeze  from  eternity.  The 
same  with  biology  in  the  light  of  evolution. 

The  humanistic  view  and  the  scientific  view  of  the 
universe  supplement  each  other;  science  corrects 
and  guides  sense,  humanism  enlarges  and  colors  and 
vitalizes  science.  After  science  has  unveiled  the 
heavens,  our  human  emotions  play  about  them; 
after  it  has  revealed  to  us  the  history  of  the  earth 
and  of  man,  emotion  and  imagination  have  fresh 
material  to  work  upon.  Science  is  exact  fact;  litera- 
ture is  liberal  truth. 

The  universe  of  science  is  the  real  world;  the 
imion  of  literature  and  art  shows  what  we  make  of 

178 


LITERATURE  AND  SCIENCE 

it  —  our  interpretation  of  it,  or  huraanization  of  it. 
Literature  is  plastic,  flowing,  suggestive;  science  is 
exact,  uncompromising,  inflexible.  If  you  want  to 
know  the  exact  condition  of  the  weather,  consult  the 
thermometer  and  the  barometer  and  the  hygrome- 
ter, but  if  you  want  to  know  the  quality  of  the  day, 
or  the  subtle  difference  between  spring  and  fall,  and 
the  morning  and  the  evening,  or  between  one  day 
and  another,  consult  your  senses.  The  body  will  tell 
you  what  the  instruments  will  not  —  the  character 
of  the  day  —  its  balminess,  softness,  sweetness;  but 
it  will  not  tell  you  the  exact  temperature,  or  the 
amount  of  moisture  in  the  air,  or  the  degree  of  pres- 
sure. The  result  of  our  sense  impressions  gives  us 
the  material  of  literature;  the  thermometer  and  the 
barometer  give  us  science,  exact  knowledge,  knowl- 
edge shorn  of  its  fringe  of  poetry.  The  body  and  the 
mind  sympathize  with  surrounding  conditions;  im- 
plements of  precision  do  not. 

Science  reveals  things  as  they  are  in  and  of  them- 
selves; literature,  as  they  stand  related  to  our  men- 
tal and  emotional  condition  and  edification.  One  is 
not  true  and  the  other  false;  both  are  true  in  their 
own  sphere,  true  as  fact,  and  true  as  emotion  and 
idea.  Science  explains  the  rainbow,  but  literature 
sees  it  as  a  symbol  and  a  promise.  So  with  the 
sunset  or  the  sunrise.  Science  knows  all  about  the 
diamond,  but  knows  not  why  it  is  so  prized  by  us. 
It  explains  the  pearl,  but  not  the  pearl  necklace. 

179 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

Science  analyzes  all  the  life-processes,  and  knows  all 
the  mechanism  of  living  beings;  but  it  cannot  find 
the  secret  of  Hfe.  Life,  as  such,  it  knows  not;  it  only 
knows  its  material  elements.  Literature  alone  can 
grasp  and  interpret  life;  it  names  a  vital  force  at 
which  science  scoffs;  it  names  spirit,  but  spirit  does 
not  fall  within  the  categories  of  science.  The  latest 
biological  science  names  a  new  force,  **biotic  en- 
ergy,"—  an  old  friend  with  a  new  name;  and  it 
names  a  new  substance,  "plasmogen,"  which  it  has 
not  yet  found,  and  which  is  just  as  hypothetical  as 
vital  force. 

The  scientific  interpretation  of  the  universe  repels 
a  great  many  minds  because  it  lays  the  emphasis 
upon  matter  itself  instead  of  upon  something  super- 
material.  It  hesitates  to  name  a  creative  energy,  but 
makes  matter  itself  creative,  and  does  not  try  to 
help  it  out  with  teleological  conception.  Science 
sees  man  arise  out  of  the  earth,  as  literally  as  it  sees 
the  plants  and  the  trees  arise,  and  it  is  convinced 
that  if  a  moving  picture  could  be  had  of  man's  long 
and  wonderful  line  of  descent  through  the  geologic 
ages,  we  should  see  his  development  or  growth  from 
imorganized  matter  up  through  himdreds  of  chang- 
ing living  forms  during  the  geological  ages,  till  we 
behold  him  as  he  is  to-day.  Condense  his  history, 
cut  out  the  element  of  time,  as  the  moving-picture 
machine  cuts  it  out  of  the  changes  in  the  growing 
plant,  and  behold  the  protozoa  mount  and  unfold, 

180 


LITERATURE  AND  SCIENCE 

putting  on  and  off  form  after  form,  till  man  appears 
at  the  end  of  the  series. 

This  is  the  ministry  of  physical  science,  to  reveal 
to  us  the  divinity  that  lurks  in  the  ground  under- 
foot. We  do  not  so  much  need  its  services  to  point 
out  the  glory  and  grandeur  overhead.  In  all  ages 
man  has  been  aware  of  this;  but  the  soil  he  treads, 
the  bodies  that  impede  his  way,  he  has  spurned  with 
his  foot;  they  were  anathema  to  him.  They  were  the 
antithesis  of  spirit,  and  his  enemy.  The  heavens 
declared  the  glory  of  God  because  they  were  so  far 
off;  near  at  hand,  they  were  of  the  earth,  earthy. 
Science  teaches  us  that  the  earth  is  a  celestial  body 
also,  and  that  there  is  no  better  or  finer  stuff  in 
the  heavens  above  than  in  the  earth  beneath,  and 
Whitman*s  lines  indicate  this  fact  — 

"Underneath,  the  divine  soil. 
Overhead,  the  sun." 

But  the  moral  and  religious  import  of  this  stupen- 
dous truth  has  not  yet  influenced  our  habits  of 
thought;  we  are  still  the  prisoners  of  the  old  dualism. 

II 

As  I  have  said,  the  two  types  of  mind,  the  scien- 
tific and  the  artistic,  the  analytic  and  the  synthetic, 
look  upon  nature  and  life  with  quite  different  eyes. 
Wordsworth  said  of  his  poet  that  he  was  quite  "con- 
tented to  enjoy  what  others  understood."  When 
Whitman,  as  he  records  in  one  of  his  poems,  Ikd 

181 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

from  the  lecture-hall  where  the  "learned  astrono- 
mer" was  discoursing  about  the  stars,  and  in  silence 
gazed  up  at  the  sky  gemmed  with  them,  he  showed 
clearly  to  which  type  he  belonged.  Tyndall  said 
that  men  of  warm  feelings,  with  minds  open  to  the 
elevating  impressions  produced  by  nature  as  a 
whole,  whose  satisfaction  therefore  is  rather  ethical 
than  logical,  lean  to  the  synthetic  side,  while  the 
analytic  harmonizes  best  with  the  more  precise  and 
more  mechanical  bias  which  seeks  the  satisfaction 
of  the  understanding.  Tyndall  said  of  Goethe  that 
while  his  discipline  as  a  poet  went  well  with  his  nat- 
ural history  studies,  it  hindered  his  approach  to  the 
physical  and  mechanical  sciences.  Tyndall,  him- 
self, was  a  notable  blending  of  the  two  types  of 
mind;  to  his  proficiency  in  analytical  and  experimen- 
tal science  he  joined  literary  gifts  of  a  high  order. 
It  is  these  gifts  that  make  his  work  rank  high  in  the 
literature  of  science. 

Tyndall  was  wont  to  explain  his  mechanistic 
views  of  creation  to  Carlyle,  whom  he  greatly  re- 
vered. But  Carlyle  did  not  take  kindly  to  them. 
This  was  one  of  the  phases  of  physical  science  which 
repelled  him.  Carlyle  revolted  at  the  idea  that  the 
sun  was  the  physical  basis  of  life.  He  could  not  en- 
dure any  teaching  that  savored  of  materialism.  He 
would  not  think  of  the  universe  as  a  machine,  but  as 
an  organism.  Yggdrasill,  the  Tree  of  Life,  was  his 
favorite  image.  Considering  how  the  concrete  forces 

182 


LITERxVTURE  AND  SCIENCE 

of  the  universe  circulate  and  pull  to^'clhcr,  he  found 
no  similitude  so  true  as  that  of  the  tree.  "Beauti- 
ful, altogether  beautiful  and  great,"  said  he.  "The 
Machine  of  the  universe  —  alas!  to  think  of  that  in 
contrast!" 

Carlyle  was  a  poet  and  a  prophet  and  saw  the 
world  through  his  moral  and  spiritual  nature,  and 
not  through  his  logical  faculties.  He  revolted  at  the 
conception  of  the  mystery  we  name  life  being  the 
outcome  of  physical  and  chemical  forces  alone. 

Literature,  art,  and  religion  are  not  only  not  fos- 
tered by  the  scientific  spirit,  but  this  spirit,  it  seems 
to  me,  is  almost  fatal  to  them,  at  least  so  far  as  it 
banishes  mystery  and  illusion,  and  checks  or  inhibits 
our  anthropomorphic  tendencies.  Literature  and 
art  have  their  genesis  in  love,  joy,  admiration,  spec- 
ulation, and  not  in  the  exact  knowledge  which  is  the 
foundation  of  science.  Our  creative  faculties  may 
profit  by  exact  knowledge  of  material  things,  but 
they  can  hardly  be  inspired  by  it.  Inspiration  is 
from  within,  but  scientific  knowledge  is  from 
without. 

There  is  no  literature  or  art  without  love  and  con- 
templation. We  can  make  literature  out  of  science 
only  when  we  descend  upon  it  with  love,  or  with 
some  degree  of  emotional  enjoyment.  Natural  his- 
tory, geology,  biology,  astronomy,  yield  literary  ma- 
terial only  to  the  man  of  emotion  and  imagination. 
Into  the  material  gathered  from  outward  nature 

183 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

the  creative  artist  puts  himself,  as  the  bee  puts 
herself  into  the  nectar  she  gathers  from  the  flowers 
to  make  it  into  honey.  Honey  is  the  nectar  plus  the 
bee;  and  a  poem,  or  other  work  of  art,  is  fact  and 
observation  plus  the  man.    In  so  far  as  scientific 
knowledge  checks  our  tendency  to  humanize  nature, 
and  to  infuse  ourselves  into  it,  and  give  to  it  the 
hues  of  our  own  spirits,  it  is  the  enemy  of  literature 
and  art.   In  so  far  as  it  gives  us  a  wider  and  truer 
conception  of  the  material  universe,  which  it  cer- 
tainly has  done  in  every  great  science,  it  ought  to  be 
their  friend  and  benefactor.  Our  best  growth  is  at- 
tained when  we  match  knowledge  with  love,  insight 
with  reverence,  understanding  with  sympathy  and 
enjoyment;  else  the  machine  becomes  more  and 
more,  and  the  man  less  and  less. 

Fear,  superstition,  misconception,  have  played 
a  great  part  in  the  literature  and  religion  of  the 
past;  they  have  given  it  reality,  picturesqueness, 
and  power;  it  remains  to  be  seen  if  love,  knowledge, 
democracy,  and  human  brotherhood  can  do  as  well. 

Ill 

The  literary  treatment  of  scientific  matter  is  nat- 
urally of  much  more  interest  to  the  general  reader 
than  to  the  man  of  science.  By  literary  treatment  I 
do  not  mean  taking  liberties  with  facts,  but  treating 
them  so  as  to  give  the  reader  a  lively  and  imagina- 
tive realization  of  them  —  a  sense  of  their  aesthetic 

184 


LITERATURE  AND  SCIENCE 

and  intellectual  values.  The  creative  mind  can 
quicken  a  dead  fact  and  make  it  mean  something  in 
the  emotional  sphere. 

When  we  humanize  things,  we  are  beyond  the 
sphere  of  science  and  in  the  sj)here  of  literature.  We 
may  still  be  dealing  with  truths,  but  not  with  facts. 
Tyndall,  in  his  "Fragments,"  very  often  rises  from 
the  sphere  of  science  into  that  of  literature.  He  does 
so,  for  instance,  in  considering  the  question  of  per- 
sonal identity  in  relation  to  that  of  molecular  change 
in  the  body.   He  asks :  — 

How  is  the  sense  of  personal  identity  maintained  across 
this  flight  of  the  molecules  that  goes  on  incessantly  in  our 
bodies,  so  that  while  our  physical  being,  after  a  certain 
number  of  years,  is  entirely  renewed,  our  consciousness 
exhibits  no  solution  of  continuity?  Like  clianging  sen- 
tinels, the  oxygen,  hydrogen,  and  carbon  that  depart 
seem  to  whisper  their  secret  to  their  comrades  that  arrive, 
and  thus,  while  the  Non-ego  shifts,  the  Ego  remains  the 
same.  Constancy  of  form  in  the  groujiing  of  tlie  mole- 
cules, and  not  constancy  of  the  molecules  tliemsclves,  is 
the  correlative  of  this  constancy  of  perception.  Life  is  a 
wave  which  in  no  two  consecutive  moments  of  existence 
is  composed  of  the  same  particles. 

Tyndall  has  here  stated  a  scientific  fact  in  the 
picturesque  and  poetic  manner  of  literature.  Henri 
Bergson  docs  this  on  nearly  every  page.  When  his 
subject-matter  is  scientific,  his  treatment  of  it  is 
literary.  Indeed,  the  secret  of  the  charm  and  power 
of  his  "Creative  Evolution"  is  the  rare  fusion  and 

185 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

absorption  of  its  scientific  and  philosophical  mate- 
rial, by  the  literary  and  artistic  spirit. 

How  vividly  present  Huxley  is  in  everything  he 
writes  or  speaks,  the  man  shining  through  his  sen- 
tences as  if  the  sword  were  to  shine  through  its  scab- 
bard !  —  a  different  type  from  Tyndall,  more  con- 
troversial. A  lover  of  combat,  he  sniffs  the  battle 
afar;  he  is  less  poetical  than  Tyndall,  less  given  to 
rhetoric,  but  more  a  part  of  what  he  says,  and  hav- 
ing a  more  absolutely  transparent  style.  How  he 
charged  the  foes  of  Darwin,  and  cleared  the  field  of 
them  in  a  hurry !  His  sentences  went  through  their 
arguments  as  steel  through  lead. 

As  a  sample  of  fine  and  eloquent  literary  state- 
ment I  have  always  greatly  admired  that  closing 
passage  in  his  essay  on  "Science  and  Morals"  in 
which  he  defends  physical  science  against  the  at- 
tacks of  Mr.  Lilly,  who,  armed  with  the  weapons  of 
both  theology  and  philosophy,  denounced  it  as  the 
evil  genius  of  modern  days :  — 

If  the  diseases  of  society  [says  Huxley]  consist  in  the 
weakness  of  its  faith  in  the  existence  of  the  God  of  the 
theologians,  in  a  future  state,  and  in  uncaused  volitions, 
the  indication,  as  the  doctors  s.a3%  is  to  suppress  Theology 
and  Philosophy,  whose  bickerings  about  things  of  which 
they  know  nothing  have  been  the  prime  cause  and  con- 
tinual sustenance  of  that  evil  skepticism  which  is  the 
Nemesis  of  meddling  with  the  unknowable. 

Cinderella  is  modestly  conscious  of  her  ignorance  of 
these  high  matters.  She  lights  the  fire,  sweeps  the  house, 

186 


LITERATURE  AND  SCIENCE 

and  provides  the  dinner;  and  is  rewarded  by  being  told 
that  she  is  a  base  creature,  devoted  to  low  and  material 
interests.  But  in  her  garret  she  has  fairy  visions  out  of  the 
ken  of  the  pair  of  shrews  who  are  quarreling  downstairs. 
She  sees  the  order  which  pervades  the  seeming  disorder 
of  the  world;  the  great  drama  of  evolution,  with  its  full 
share  of  pity  and  terror,  hut  also  with  abundant  goodness 
and  beauty,  unrolls  itself  before  her  eyes;  and  she  learns 
in  her  heart  of  hearts  the  lesson,  that  the  foundation  of 
morality  is  to  have  done,  once  and  for  all,  with  lying;  to 
give  up  pretending  to  believe  that  for  which  there  is  no 
evidence,  and  repeating  unintelligible  proi)ositions  about 
things  beyond  the  possibilities  of  knowledge. 

She  knows  that  the  safety  of  morality  lies  neither  in  the 
adoption  of  this  or  that  theological  creed,  but  in  a  real 
and  living  belief  in  that  fixed  order  of  nature  which  sends 
social  disorganization  upon  the  track  of  immorality  as 
surely  as  it  sends  physical  disease  after  physical  tres- 
passes. And  of  that  firm  and  lively  faith  it  is  her  high 
mission  to  be  the  priestess. 

Although  Tyndall  and  Huxley  possessed  fine  liter- 
ary equipments,  making  them  masters  of  the  art  of 
eloquent  and  effective  statement,  they  were  never- 
theless on  their  guard  against  any  anthroponiori)liic 
tendencies.  They  were  not  unaware  of  the  emotion 
of  the  beautiful,  the  sublime,  the  mysterious,  but  as 
men  of  science  they  could  interpret  evolution  only 
in  terms  of  matter  and  energy.  Most  of  their  writ- 
ings are  good  literature,  not  because  the  authors 
humanize  the  subject-matter  and  read  themselves 
into  Nature's  script,  but  because  they  are  masters 

187 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

of  the  art  of  expression,  and  give  us  a  lively  sense  of 
the  workings  of  their  own  minds. 

Herbert  Spencer,  so  far  as  I  have  read  him,  never 
breathes  the  air  of  pure  literature.  "Life,"  says 
Spencer,  *'is  a  continuous  adjustment  of  internal 
relations  to  external  relations."  In  other  words, 
without  air,  water,  and  food  our  bodies  would  cease 
to  function  and  life  would  end.  Spencer's  definition 
is,  of  course,  true  so  far  as  it  goes,  but  it  is  of  no  more 
interest  than  any  other  statement  of  mere  fact.  It  is 
like  opaque  and  inert  matter.  Tyndall's  free  charac- 
terization of  life  as  a  "wave  which  in  no  two  con- 
secutive moments  of  existence  is  composed  of  the 
same  particles"  pleases  much  more,  because  the 
wave  is  a  beautiful  and  suggestive  object.  The 
mind  is  at  once  started  upon  the  inquiry.  What  is  it 
that  lifts  the  water  up  in  the  form  of  a  wave  and 
travels  on,  while  the  water  stays  behind?  It  is  a 
force  imparted  by  the  wind,  but  where  did  the  wind 
get  it,  and  what  is  the  force?  The  impulse  we  call 
life  lifts  the  particles  of  the  inorganic  up  into  the 
organic,  into  the  myriad  forms  of  life,  —  plant,  tree, 
bird,  animal,  —  and,  when  it  has  run  its  course, 
lets  them  drop  back  again  into  their  original  ele- 
ments. 

Spencer  was  foreordained  to  the  mechanistic  view 
of  life.  His  mind  moves  in  the  geometric  plane.  It 
is  a  military  and  engineering  intellect  applied  to  the 
problems  of  organic  nature.    How  smoothly  and 

188 


LITERATURE  AND  SCIENCE 

orderly  his  intellect  runs,  with  what  force  and  i)reci- 
sion,  turning  out  its  closely  woven  philosoi)hical 
fabric  as  great  looms  turn  out  square  miles  of  tex- 
tiles, without  a  break  or  a  flaw  in  the  process. 
Never  was  a  mind  of  such  power  so  little  inspired; 
never  was  an  imagination  of  such  compass  so  com- 
pletely tamed  and  broken  into  the  service  of  the  rea- 
soning intellect.  There  is  no  more  aerial  perspective 
in  his  pages  than  there  is  in  a  modern  manufacturing- 
plant,  and  no  hint  w^hatever  of  "the  light  that  never 
was  on  sea  or  land."  We  feel  the  machine-like  run 
of  his  sentences,  each  one  coming  round  with  the 
regularity  and  precision  of  the  revolving  arms  of 
a  patent  harvester,  making  a  clean  sweep  and  a 
smooth  cut;  the  homogeneous  and  the  heterogene- 
ous, the  external  and  the  internal,  the  inductive  and 
the  deductive  processes,  alternating  in  a  sort  of 
rhythmic  beat  like  the  throb  of  an  engine.  Si)encer 
had  a  prodigious  mind  crammed  with  a  prodigious 
number  of  facts,  but  a  more  juiceless,  soulless  sj's- 
tem  of  philosophy  has  probably  never  emanated 
from  the  human  intellect. 

IV 

The  tendency  to  get  out  of  the  si)here  of  science 
—  the  sphere  of  the  verifiable  —  into  the  sphere  of 
literature,  or  of  theology,  or  of  philosophy,  is  j)ro- 
nounced,  even  in  many  scientific  minds.  It  is  pro- 
nounced in  Sir  Oliver  Lodge,  as  seen  in  his  book  on 

189 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

"Science  and  Immortality."  It  is  very  pronounced 
in  Alfred  Russel  Wallace;  in  fact,  in  his  later  work 
his  anthropomorphism  is  rampant.  He  has  cut  more 
fantastic  tricks  before  the  high  heaven  of  science 
than  any  other  man  of  our  time  of  equal  scientific 
attainments.  What  a  contrast  to  the  sane,  patient, 
and  truth-loving  mind  of  Darwin!  Yet  Darwin,  it 
seems  to  me,  humanized  his  birds  when  he  endowed 
the  females  with  human  femininity,  attributing  to 
them  love  of  ornament  and  of  fine  plumage,  and 
making  this  love  of  ornamentation  the  basis  of  his 
theory  of  sexual  selection.  It  seems  as  though  in 
that  case  he  could  not  find  the  key  to  his  problem, 
and  so  proceeded  to  make  one  —  a  trick  to  which 
we  are  all  prone. 

Since  science  dehumanizes  nature,  its  progress  as 
science  is  in  proportion  as  it  triumphs  over  the  an- 
thropomorphic character  w^hich  our  hopes,  our  fears, 
our  partialities,  in  short,  oiu-  innate  humanism,  has 
bestowed  upon  the  outward  world.  Literature,  on 
the  other  hand,  reverses  this  process,  and  humanizes 
everything  it  looks  upon;  its  products  are  the  fruit 
of  the  human  personality  playing  upon  the  things  of 
life  and  nature,  making  everything  redolent  of  hu- 
man qualities,  and  speaking  to  the  heart  and  to  the 
imagination.  Science  divests  nature  of  all  human 
attributes  and  speaks  to  impersonal  reason  alone. 
For  science  to  be  anthropomorphic  is  to  cease  to  be 
science;  and  for  literature  to  be  anything  else  is  to 

190 


LITERATURE  AND  SCIENCE 

fail  as  literature.  Accordingly,  the  poet  is  poet  by 
virtue  of  his  power  to  make  himself  the  centre  and 
focus  of  the  things  about  him,  but  the  scienlific 
mind  is  such  by  virtue  of  its  power  to  emancipate 
itself  from  human  and  personal  consideration,  and 
rest  with  the  naked  fact.  There  is  no  art  without  the 
play  of  personality,  and  there  is  no  science  till  we 
have  escaped  from  personality,  and  from  all  forms  of 
the  anthropomorphism  that  doth  so  easily  beset  us. 
It  is  not  that  science  restricts  the  imagination;  it  is 
that  it  sterilizes  nature,  so  to  speak,  reducing  it  to 
inorganic  or  non-human  elements.  This  is  why  the 
world  as  science  sees  it  is  to  so  many  minds  a  dead 
world. 

When  we  find  fault  with  science,  and  accuse  it  of 
leading  us  to  a  blank  w^all  of  material  things,  or  of 
deadening  our  aesthetic  sensibilities,  we  are  finding 
fault  w4th  it  because  it  looks  upon  the  universe  in 
the  light  of  cold  reason,  and  not  through  that  of  the 
emotions.  But  our  physical  well-being  demands  the 
dehumanization  of  the  physical  world;  until  we  see 
our  true  relation  to  the  forces  amid  which  we  live 
and  move,  —  our  concrete  bodily  relations,  —  we 
are  like  children  playing  with  fire,  or  with  edged 
tools,  or  with  explosives.  Man  made  no  headway 
against  disease,  against  plague  and  pestilence,  till 
he  outgrew  his  humanistic  views,  dissociated  them 
from  evil  spirits  and  ofi'ended  deities,  and  looked 
upon  them  as  within  the  pale  of  natural  causation. 

191 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

Early  man  saw  and  felt  and  heard  spirits  on  all  sides 
of  him  —  in  fire,  in  water,  in  air;  but  he  controlled 
and  used  these  things  only  so  far  as  he  was  practi- 
cally scientific.  To  catch  the  wind  in  his  sails  he  had 
to  put  himself  in  right  physical  relation  to  it.  If  he 
stayed  the  ravages  of  flood  or  fire,  Ye  was  compelled 
to  cease  to  propitiate  these  powers  as  offended  dei- 
ties, and  fight  them  with  non-human  forces,  as  he 
does  to-day.  And  the  man  of  to-day  may  have  any 
number  of  superstitions  about  his  relations  to  the 
things  around  him,  and  about  theirs  to  him,  but  he 
is  successful  in  dealing  with  them  only  when  he 
forgets  his  superstitions  and  approaches  things  on 
rational  grounds. 

Our  fathers  who  held  that  every  event  of  their 
lives  was  fixed  and  unalterable,  according  to  the 
decrees  of  an  omnipotent  being,  could  not  have  sur- 
vived had  their  daily  conduct  been  in  harmony  with 
their  beliefs.  But  when  ill,  they  sent  for  the  doctor; 
if  the  house  got  afire,  they  tried  to  put  the  fire  out; 
if  crops  failed,  they  improved  their  husbandry. 
They  slowly  learned  that  better  sanitation  lessened 
the  death-rate;  that  temperate  habits  prolonged 
life;  that  signs  and  wonders  in  the  heavens  and  in 
the  earth  had  no  human  significance;  that  wars 
abated  as  men  grew  more  just  and  reasonable.  We 
come  to  grief  the  moment  that  we  forget  that  Na- 
ture is  neither  for  nor  against  us.  We  can  master  her 
forces  only  when  we  see  them  as  they  are  in  and  of 

192 


LITERATURE  AND  SCIENCE 

themselves,  and  realize  that  they  make  no  exception 
in  our  behalf. 

The  superstitious  ages,  the  ages  of  religious  wars 
and  persecutions,  the  ages  of  famine  and  pestilence, 
were  the  ages  when  man's  humanization  of  Nature 
was  at  its  height;  and  they  were  the  ages  of  the  great 
literature  and  art,  because,  as  we  have  seen,  these 
things  thrive  best  in  such  an  atmosphere.  Take  the 
gods  and  devils,  the  good  and  bad  spirits,  fate,  and 
foreknowledge,  and  the  whole  supernatural  hier- 
archy out  of  the  literature  and  art  of  the  past,  and 
what  have  we  left?  Take  them  out  of  Homer  and 
iEschylus  and  Virgil  and  Dante  and  Milton,  and  we 
come  pretty  near  to  making  ashes  of  them.  In  mod- 
ern literature,  or  the  literature  of  a  scientific  age, 
these  things  play  an  insignificant  part.  Take  them 
out  of  Shakespeare,  and  the  main  things  are  left; 
take  them  out  of  Tennyson,  and  the  best  remains; 
take  them  out  of  Whitman,  and  the  effect  is  hardly 
appreciable.  Whitman's  anthropomorphism  is  very 
active.  The  whole  universe  is  directed  to  Whitman, 
to  you,  to  me;  but  Whitman  makes  little  or  no  use  of 
the  old  stock  material  of  the  poets.  He  seeks  to  draw 
into  himself  and  to  assimilate  and  imbue  with  tlie  hu- 
man spirit  the  entire  huge  materialism  of  the  modern 
democratic  world.  He  gives  the  first  honors  to  sci- 
ence, but  its  facts,  he  says,  are  not  his  dwelling;  — 

"I  but  enter  by  them  to  an  area  of  my  dwelling." 

193 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

Being  a  poet,  he  must  live  in  the  world  of  the  emo- 
tions, the  intuitions,  the  imagination,  —  the  world 
of  love,  fellowship,  beauty,  religion,  the  super- 
scientific  world.  As  practical  beings  with  need  of 
food,  shelter,  transportation,  we  have  to  deal  with 
the  facts  within  the  sphere  of  physical  science;  as 
social,  moral,  and  sesthetic  beings,  we  live  in  the 
super-scientific  world.  Our  house  of  life  has  upper 
stories  that  look  off  to  the  sky  and  the  stars.  We  are 
less  as  men  than  our  fathers,  have  less  power  of 
character,  but  are  more  as  tools  and  vehicles  of  the 
scientific  intellect. 

Man  lives  in  his  emotions,  his  hopes  and  fears,  his 
loves  and  sympathies,  his  predilections  and  his  affin- 
ities, more  than  in  his  reason.  Hence,  as  we  have 
more  and  more  science,  we  must  have  less  and  less 
great  literature;  less  and  less  religion;  less  and  less 
superstition,  and  should  have  less  and  less  racial 
and  political  antagonisms,  and  more  and  more  free- 
dom and  fellowship  in  all  fields  and  with  all  peoples. 
Science  tends  to  unify  the  nations  and  make  one 
family  of  them. 

The  antique  world  produced  great  literature  and 
great  art,  but  much  of  its  science  was  childish.  We 
produce  great  science,  but  much  of  our  literature 
and  art  is  feeble  and  imitative. 

Science,  as  such,  neither  fears,  nor  dreads,  nor 
wonders,  nor  trembles,  nor  scoffs,  nor  scorns;  is  not 
puffed  up;  thinketh  no  evil;  has  no  prejudices;  turns 

194 


LITERATURE  AND  SCIENCE 

aside  for  nothing.  Though  all  our  gods  totter  and 
fall,  it  must  go  its  way.  It  dispels  our  illusions 
because  it  clears  our  vision.  It  kills  superstition 
because  it  banishes  our  irrational  fears. 

Mathematical  and  scientific  truths  are  fixed  and 
stable  quantities;  they  are  like  the  inorganic  com- 
pounds; but  the  truths  of  literature,  of  art,  of  reli- 
gion, of  philosophy,  are  in  perpetual  flux  and  trans- 
formation, like  the  same  compounds  in  the  stream 
of  life. 

How  much  of  the  power  and  the  charm  of  the 
poetic  treatment  of  nature  lies  in  the  fact  that  the 
poet  reads  himself  into  the  objects  he  portrays,  and 
thus  makes  everything  alive  and  full  of  human 
interest !  He  sees  — 

"The  jocund  day 
Stand  tip-toe  on  the  misty  mount<ain-top"; 

he  sees  the  highest  peak  of  the  mountain  range  tobe— 

"The  last  to  parley  with  the  setting  sun"; 

he  sees — ■ 

"The  white  arms  out  in  the  breakers  tirelessly  tossing  "; 

while  the  power  and  the  value  of  science  is  to  free 
itself  from  these  tendencies,  and  see  things  in  the 
white  light  of  reason.  Science  is  the  enemy  of  our 
myth-making  tendency,  but  it  is  the  friend  of  our 
physical  well-being. 

Every  material  thing  and  process  has  its  physics, 
which,  in  most  cases,  seem  utterly  inadequate  to 

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UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

account  for  the  thing  as  it  stands  to  us.  Life  is  a 
flower,  and  the  analysis  of  it  does  not  tell  us  why  we 
are  so  moved  by  it.  The  moral,  the  aesthetic,  the 
spiritual  values  which  we  find  in  life  and  in  nature 
are  utterly  beyond  the  range  of  physical  science,  and 
I  suppose  it  is  because  the  physicochemical  expla- 
nation of  the  phenomenon  of  life  takes  no  account, 
and  can  take  no  account,  of  these,  that  it  leaves  us 
cold  and  uninterested.  Spencer  with  his  irrefragable 
mechanistic  theories  leaves  us  indifferent,  while 
Bergson,  with  his  "Creative  Evolution,"  sets  mind 
and  spirit  all  aglow.  One  interprets  organic  nature 
in  terms  of  matter  and  motion,  the  other  interprets 
it  in  terms  of  life  and  spirit. 

Science  is  the  critic  and  doctor  of  life,  but  never 
its  inspirer.  It  enlarges  the  field  of  literature,  but  its 
aims  are  unliterary.  The  scientific  explanation  of 
the  great  problems  —  life,  mind,  consciousness  — 
seems  strangely  inadequate;  they  are  like  the  scien- 
tific definition  of  light  as  vibrations  or  electric  oscil- 
lations in  the  ether  of  space,  which  would  not  give  a 
blind  man  much  idea  of  light.  The  scientific  method 
is  supreme  in  its  own  sphere,  but  that  sphere  is  not 
commensurate  with  the  whole  of  human  life.  Life 
flowers  in  the  subjective  world  of  our  sentiments, 
emotions,  and  aspirations,  and  to  this  world  liter- 
ature, art,  and  religion  alone  have  the  key. 


XII 

"A  PROPHET  OF  THE  SOUL" 

I 

IN  taking  this  line  from  Emerson  for  the  title  of 
an  essay  on  Henri  Bergson,  I  would  indicate  at 
once  the  aspect  of  his  philosophy  that  most  appeals 
to  me.  The  overarching  conception  in  his  writings 
is  the  immanence  and  the  potency  of  spirit  or  con- 
sciousness in  matter,  and  his  "Creative  Evolution'* 
is  the  unfolding  of  the  drama,  as  he  conceives  it,  of 
the  struggles  of  this  spirit  with  the  opposition  which 
it  encounters  in  the  material  world,  and  its  triumphs 
over  it.  Arnold  said  that  Emerson  was  the  friend 
and  aider  of  those  who  would  live  in  the  spirit;  we 
may  say  of  Bergson  that  he  is  the  friend  and  aider 
of  those  who  would  see  with  the  spirit  and  enter  into 
the  mystery  of  creation  through  intellectual  sympa- 
thy or  intuition,  instead  of  making  the  vain  attempt 
to  do  so  through  the  logical  and  scientific  under- 
standing. The  true  inwardness  of  living  things,  or  of 
the  creative  movement,  cannot  be  reached  through 
the  practical  intellect,  available  as  it  is  only  for  our 
action  upon  concrete  bodies  and  forces. 

I  am  not  familiar  with  all  of  Professor  Bergson 's 
published  works.    I  have  read  the  essay  on  the 

197 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

"Philosophy  of  Laughter,'*  the  " Litroduction  to 
Metaphysics,"  and  the  "Creative  Evolution,"  his 
masterpiece.  It  was  also  my  privilege  to  hear  some 
of  his  lectures  at  Columbia  University  in  the  winter 
of  1912,  and  to  meet  him  personally. 

A  view  of  the  man  always  seems  to  bring  one 
nearer  to  an  understanding  of  his  work.  In  person 
Bergson  is  a  small,  slender,  rather  shy  man,  with 
a  wonderfully  beautiful  and  symmetrical  head  —  a 
large  brain,  filled  out  and  rounded  on  all  sides;  face 
smooth  and  thin,  with  a  close-cropped  mustache; 
prominent,  finely  chiseled  aquiline  nose;  small,  ex- 
pressive eyes  in  deep  sockets  overhung  by  heavy, 
mobile  eyebrows  —  an  Emersonian  type  of  face 
with  more  than  the  Emersonian  size  and  beauty 
of  brain,  lacking  only  the  powerful  Emersonian 
mouth. 

His  lectures  in  French  were  delivered  without 
notes,  in  an  animated  conversational  style,  his 
hands,  within  a  narrow  circle,  being  as  active  as  his 
mind.  Not  an  imposing  figure  on  the  platform  or  off, 
nor  an  aggressive  and  dominating  personality,  but 
a  gentle,  winsome  man,  the  significant  beauty  of 
whose  head  one  cannot  easily  forget.  Those  who 
were  fortunate  enough  to  hear  him  may  well  have 
felt  that  they  were  seeing  and  hearing  a  modern 
Plato  or  Kant  or  Hegel,  for  surely  his  work  is  des- 
tined to  make  as  distinct  an  epoch  in  the  history 
of  philosophy  as  did  theirs. 

198 


<( 


A  PROPHET  OF  THE  SOUL 


His  essay  on  laughter  is  undoubtedly  the  most 
convincing  and  satisfactory  exposition  of  the  subject 
that  has  yet  been  made.  One  phase  of  its  central 
idea,  —  namely,  that  we  laugh  at  inanimate  objects 
when  they  behave  like  human  beings  and  vice  versa, 
—  I  saw  illustrated  at  a  farmhouse  in  the  Catskills 
last  summer.  The  water  from  a  spring  on  the  hill 
was  brought  to  the  house  in  a  pipe  which  discharg(.»J 
into  a  half -barrel  near  the  kitchen  door.  Into  the 
end  of  a  pipe  a  plug  had  been  driven  with  a  good 
sized  gimlet-hole  in  the  end  of  it.  Out  of  this  hole  a 
jet  of  water  came  with  great  force,  striking  the  water 
in  the  tub  a  few  inches  from  the  rim,  at  an  angle  of 
about  forty-five  degrees,  and  driving  deeply  into  it. 
One  day  I  was  washing  some  apples  in  the  tub,  and 
while  they  were  floating  about  I  noticed  that  they 
all  tended  to  line  up  on  the  west  side  of  the  barrel 
and  then  move  up  in  a  slow,  hesitating  manner  to  a 
point  just  behind  the  jet  of  water.  I  became  an  in- 
terested spectator.  Slowly  the  apples  in  procession 
in  close  line  turned  toward  the  little  vortex  made 
by  the  jet.  The  one  in  the  lead  seemed  to  hesitate 
just  on  the  edge  of  the  danger-line,  as  if  it  would  fain 
draw  back;  then,  while  you  were  looking,  it  would 
so  suddenly  disappear  beneath  the  plunging  jet  that 
the  eye  could  not  trace  its  movements;  its  hesitation 
was  followed  by  such  a  lightning-like  plunge  that  it 
astonished  one.  One  fancied  he  could  almost  sec 
tiny  heels  flash  in  the  air  as  the  apple  went  down. 

199 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

Then  it  came  bobbing  up  in  the  boihng  water  on  the 
other  side  of  the  tub  in  a  very  hilarious  manner,  and 
slowly  took  its  place  at  the  rear  end  of  the  line,  while 
the  apple  next  in  the  ranks  approached  the  jet  in  the 
same  coy,  doubtful  manner,  and  made  the  instan- 
taneous plunge.  Then  the  next  and  the  next,  till  an 
endless  procession  of  apparently  demure,  but  fun- 
loving  apples  was  established  that  kept  up  the  circus 
day  and  night. 

I  was  wont  to  take  my  callers  out  to  the  tub,  with- 
out any  explanation,  to  let  them  see  my  apple  per- 
formers. Invariably  every  one  of  them,  after  they 
had  gazed  a  moment,  broke  out  into  a  hearty  laugh. 
"What  are  you  laughing  at?'*  I  would  inquire. 
"Why,  it  is  so  funny;  see  how  those  apples  behave, 
like  little  people." 

If  I  looked  at  them  every  hour  in  the  day  I  was 
bound  to  laugh.  My  little  granddaughter,  seven 
years  old,  "a  moody  child,  but  wildly  wise,"  spent 
hours  watching  the  antics  of  those  apples.  She 
would  replace  them  with  others  to  see  if  they  would 
all  behave  in  the  same  way,  and  then  would  take 
them  all  out  and  lay  them  in  the  sun  as  if  to  rest  and 
warm  them.  After  some  days  the  apples  began  to 
have  a  bruised  and  overworked  look,  and  one  felt 
instinctively  like  taking  them  out.  On  the  whole  it 
was  one  of  the  most  human  performances  I  ever  saw 
inanimate  objects  engage  in,  and  confirmed  Berg- 
son's  philosophy  of  laughter  completely. 

200 


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A  PROPHET  OF  THE  SOUL" 


II 

The  reception  of  Bergson's  philosoi)hy  by  differ- 
ent types  of  mind  has,  of  course,  been  very  diverse. 
He  conquers  easily  the  higher  class  of  his  general 
readers  —  the  lovers  of  good  literature  —  because 
of  the  superb  literary  style  of  his  work;  his  philo- 
sophical readers  do  not  succumb  quite  so  readily, 
though  many  of  these  are  enthusiastic,  and  all  are 
interested;  but  he  has  a  hard  fight  with  many  of  his 
scientific  readers.  I  have  noted  but  one  man  of  sci- 
ence, the  eminent  physicist  Sir  Oliver  Lodge,  who 
is  in  accord  w^ith  the  main  drift  of  his  work.  It  is 
probably  the  philosophical,  not  to  say  theological, 
strain  in  Sir  Oliver,  and  his  love  of  good  literature, 
that  make  him  respond  so  cordially  to  Bergson, 
especially  to  his  conception  of  life  as  a  primordial 
creative  impulse  pervading  matter.  He  declares 
that  the  work  is  "peculiarly  acceptable  and  inter- 
esting to  men  of  science.'* 

Professor  Poulton  disputes  his  doctrine  of  instinct 
as  a  form  of  sympathy,  and  argues  forcibly  and  fairly 
against  it.  Sir  Edwin  Ray  Lankester,  an  eminent 
Darwinian  biologist,  in  introducing  and  endorsing 
H.  S.  R.  Elliott's  attack  upon  "  Creative  Evolution," 
expresses  his  dissent  with  angry  and  insulting  epi- 
thets. Mr.  Balfour  and  our  own  William  .James 
express  deep  sympathy  and  admiration  for  the  work 
of  the  French  philosopher.   Most  of  our  university 

201 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

philosophers  fight  shy  of  it,  I  hear,  probably  because 
it  discredits  or  limits  pure  intellectualism  as  giving 
us  the  key  to  the  real  inwardness  of  life;  we  enter 
into  this  mystery  only  through  spirit,  —  real  sym- 
pathy or  intuition,  —  and  not  through  our  logical 
faculties.  Men  who  attack  the  problem  of  living 
matter  with  the  same  tools  which  they  use  upon  the 
problem  of  dead  matter,  —  namely,  our  logical  un- 
derstanding, —  will  not,  according  to  Bergson,  get 
very  far. 

The  flexible,  sympathetic,  and  intuitive  type  of 
mind,  the  type  that  finds  expression  in  art,  in  litera- 
ture, in  religion,  and  in  all  creative  work,  will  take 
more  naturally  and  kindly  to  Bergson  than  the  rig- 
idly scientific  and  logical  mind. 

In  this  shining  stream  of  ideas  and  images  that 
flows  through  Professor  Bergson's  pages,  or  from  his 
mouth  in  the  lecture-room,  the  strictly  scientific 
man  will  probably  find  little  to  interest  him.  He 
may  approve  of  it  as  literature  and  philosophy,  but 
he  is  pretty  sure  to  feel  that  unwarranted  liberties 
have  been  taken  with  scientific  conclusions.  He  will 
deny  the  validity  of  the  principal  actor  in  the  Berg- 
sonian  drama  of  evolution;  the  cosmic  spirit,  as 
something  apart  from  and  independent  of  cosmic 
matter,  has  no  place  in  his  categories;  matter  and 
the  laws  of  matter  are  all-sufficient  for  his  purpose. 
He  must  keep  on  the  solid  ground  of  the  verifiable. 
Apparently,  to  Huxley  consciousness  is  as  strictly 

202 


"A  PROPHET  OF  THE  SOUL" 

a  physical  phenomenon  as  the  lamp  of  the  glow- 
worm, or  the  sound  of  a  clock  when  it  strikes;  and 
the  tremendous  psychic  effort  which  Bergson  sees 
in  organic  evolution  would  probably  have  appeared 
to  him  and  to  others  of  the  mechanistic  school  as 
only  a  poetic  dream. 

It  is  a  philosophy  that  goes  well  with  living  things. 
It  is  a  living  philosophy.  In  my  own  case  it  joins  on 
to  my  interest  in  outdoor  life,  in  bird,  in  flower,  in 
tree.  It  is  an  interpretation  of  biology  and  natural 
history  in  terms  of  the  ideal.  In  reading  it  I  am  in 
the  concrete  world  of  life,  bathed  in  the  light  of  the 
highest  heaven  of  thought.  It  exhilarates  me  like  a 
bath  in  the  stream,  or  a  walk  on  the  hills. 

Those  who  go  to  Bergson  for  strictly  scientific 
conclusions  will  find  bread  where  they  were  looking 
for  a  stone;  but  those  w^ho  go  to  him  in  the  spirit  of 
life  will  find  life  —  will  see  him  work  a  change  in 
scientific  facts  like  that  which  life  works  in  inorganic 
matter.  His  method  is  always  that  of  the  literary 
artist;  and  looking  at  the  processes  of  organic  evo- 
lution through  his  eyes  is  like  looking  into  the  men- 
tal and  spiritual  processes  of  a  great  creative  artist. 
Mr.  Balfour  mildly  objects  that  the  vital  impulse  as 
Bergson  reveals  it  has  "no  goal  more  definite  than 
that  of  acquiring  an  ever  fuller  volume  of  free  crea- 
tive activity."  Sir  Oliver  Lodge  replies  that  that  is  a 
good  enough  goal.  "  Is  it  not  the  goal  of  every  great 

artist?" 

203 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

III 

To  some  readers  "Creative  Evolution"  has 
opened  a  new  world.  To  open  a  new  world  to  a  man 
is  only  within  the  power  of  unique  and  original 
genius.  I  think  we  may  say  that  Bergson  is  a  dis- 
tinct species.  He  is  sui  generis.  He  has  the  quality 
of  mind  which  we  call  genius.  One  cannot  read  far  in 
his  book  without  feeling  that  here  at  last  is  an  in- 
spired philosopher,  and  inspiration  always  carries 
the  mind  through  into  the  poetic  and  the  romantic. 

The  new  world  which  Bergson  opens  to  his  reader 
is  the  world  of  organic  nature  seen  for  the  first  time 
through  the  creative  imagination  of  a  great  liter- 
ary artist  and  philosopher  combined.  Bergson  re- 
creates this  world  for  his  competent  reader  by  show- 
ing it  like  a  living  stream  issuing  from  the  primal 
cosmic  energy;  and  it  is  reflected  in  his  pages  with  a 
morning  freshness  and  promise.  The  novelty  of  his 
thought,  the  beauty  and  vitality  of  his  style,  and 
the  telling  picturesqueness  of  his  imagery  make  the 
reading  of  his  book  a  new  experience  to  the  student 
of  philosophical  literature. 

It  is  as  if  one  were  to  open  a  gate  or  a  door,  ex^ 
pecting  to  be  admitted  to  the  closed-in  air  of  aca- 
demic halls,  or  the  dim  light  of  monastic  aisles,  and 
were  to  see  before  him  instead  a  wide  prospect  with 
moving  currents  and  growing  things  and  changing 
forms  of  earth  and  sky.  It  is  doubtless  this  quality 

204 


li 


A  PROPHET  OF  THE  SOUL" 


of  Bergson's  work  that  led  William  James  to  say  of 
it  that  it  was  *'hke  a  breath  of  the  morning  and  the 
singing  of  birds." 

I  think  we  may  say  that  no  new  world  can  be 
opened  to  a  man  miless  that  world  is  akeady  in  him 
in  embryo  at  least;  then  the  poet,  the  seer,  the  in- 
spired teacher,  like  Bergson,  can  open  it  for  him. 
Wordsworth  opened  up  a  new  world  to  John  Stuart 
Mill,  Goethe  opened  up  a  new  world  to  Carlyle, 
Emerson  and  Whitman  have  been  world-openers 
in  our  own  land  and  times.  The  world-opening  to 
which  I  here  refer,  is  almost  a  sacrament;  it  implies 
a  spiritual  illumination  and  exaltation  that  does  not 
and  cannot  come  to  every  mind.  It  means  the  open- 
ing of  a  door  that  our  logical  faculties  cannot  open. 
Positive  science,  of  course,  opens  its  own  new  worlds 
of  facts  and  relations,  and  speculative  philosophy 
opens  its  new  world  of  ideas  and  concepts;  but  only 
the  inspired,  the  creative  works,  admit  us  to  the 
high  heaven  of  spiritual  freedom  itself.  We  do  not 
merely  admire  such  writers  as  Goethe,  Carlyle, 
Emerson,  Whitman;  we  experience  them,  and  they 
enter  into  our  lives.  I  think  this  is  in  a  measure  true 
of  Bergson.  With  more  method  and  system  than 
any  of  the  others  I  have  named,  he  yet  possesses  the 
same  liberating  power,  the  same  imaginative  lift, 
and  begets  in  one  a  similar  spiritual  exaltation. 

Bergson  is  first  and  foremost  a  great  literary  artist 
occupying  himself  with  problems  of  science  and 

205 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

philosophy.  The  creative  Hterary  artist  in  him  is 
always  paramount.  His  method  is  essentially  that 
of  literature  —  the  visualizing,  image-forming,  anal- 
ogy-seeking method.  He  thinks  in  symbols  and 
pictures  drawn  from  the  world  of  concrete  objects 
and  forces.  Probably  no  system  of  philosophy  was 
ever  before  put  forth  in  language  so  steeped  and 
dyed  in  the  colors  with  which  the  spirit  paints  this 
world.  His  style  illustrates  his  theme;  it  is  never 
static  or  merely  intellectual;  it  is  all  movement  and 
flexibility. 

Open  his  book  anywhere  and  your  mind  is  caught 
in  a  flowing  stream  of  lucid,  felicitous  thoughts  that 
seem  of  the  very  quality  of  life  itself.  He  visualizes 
mental  and  emotional  processes.  He  sees  spirit  and 
matter  as  two  currents  —  two  reverse  currents  — 
one  up,  one  down.  He  sees  life  struggling  with  mat- 
ter, stemming  its  tide,  seeking  to  overcome  and  use 
it;  he  sees  it  defeated  and  turned  aside  many  times, 
its  triumph  complete.  Life  or  spirit  is  freedom. 
Matter  is  the  seat  of  necessity;  it  proceeds  mechan- 
ically; it  is  obdurate,  unwilling,  automatic.  Life 
humbles  itself,  makes  itself  very  small  and  very  in- 
sinuating in  order  to  enter  into  and  overcome  the 
resistance  of  inert  matter.  It  "bends  to  physical 
and  chemical  forces,  consenting  even  to  go  part  of 
the  way  with  them,  like  the  switch  that  adopts  for  a 
while  the  direction  of  the  rail  it  is  endeavoring  to 
leave.'*   *'Life  had  to  enter  thus  into  the  habits  of 

206 


(( 


A  PROPHET  OF  THE  SOUL" 


inert  matter  in  order  to  draw  it  little  by  little,  mag- 
netized, as  it  were,  to  another  track."  *'Ages  of 
effort  and  prodigies  of  sii])tlety  were  prohahly 
necessary  for  life  to  get  past  this  new  obstacle"  — 
the  tendency  of  organized  matter  to  reach  the  limits 
of  its  expansion. 

Thus  on  every  page  does  Bergson  visualize  and 
jaaterialize  his  ideas.  He  envisages  the  process  of 
evolution  of  the  whole  organic  world.  He  sees  one 
tremendous  effort  pervading  it  from  bottom  to  top. 
He  sees  thought  or  life  caught  in  the  net  of  matter. 

It  becomes  a  prisoner  of  the  mechanism  by  which  it  has 
climbed.  From  the  humblest  of  organic  beings  to  the 
highest  vertebrates  which  just  antecede  man  we  are 
watching  an  endeavor  always  missing  success,  always  re- 
undertaken  with  an  increasingly  wise  art.  Man  has  tri- 
umphed —  but  with  diflficulty,  and  so  partially  tliat  it 
needs  only  a  moment  of  relaxation  or  inattention  for 
automatism  to  recapture  him. 

The  creative  impulse  does  not  itself  know  the 
next  step  it  will  take,  or  the  next  form  that  will  arise, 
any  more  than  the  creative  artist  determines  before- 
hand all  the  thoughts  and  forms  his  inventive  genius 
will  bring  forth.  He  has  the  impulse  or  the  inspira- 
tion to  do  a  certain  thing,  to  let  himself  go  in  a  cer- 
tain direction,  but  just  the  precise  form  his  creation 
will  take  is  as  unknown  to  him  as  to  you  and  me. 
Some  stubbornness  or  obduracy  in  his  material,  or 
some  accident  of  time  or  place,  may  make  it  quite 

207 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

different  from  what  he  had  hoped  or  vaguely 
planned.  He  does  not  know  what  thought  or  inci- 
dent or  character  he  is  looking  for  till  he  has  found 
it,  till  he  has  risen  above  his  mental  horizon.  So  far 
as  he  is  inspired,  so  far  as  he  is  spontaneous,  just  so 
far  is  the  world  with  which  he  deals  plastic  and  fluid 
and  indeterminate  and  ready  to  take  any  form  his 
medium  of  expression  —  words,  colors,  tones  — 
affords  him.  He  may  surprise  himself,  excel  himself; 
he  has  surrendered  himself  to  a  power  beyond  the 
control  of  his  will  or  knowledge. 

We  must  remember  that  man  is  a  part  of  the 
universe  —  a  part  of  the  stream  of  life  that  flows 
through  organic  nature,  and  not  something  sepa- 
rated from  it.  But  he  alone  among  living  beings  has 
come  to  self -consciousness  and  is  capable  of  the  cre- 
ative act.  Is  it  not,  therefore,  entirely  reasonable 
that  the  method  of  nature  should  be  reflected  in  his 
mind  —  that  he  should  be  a  god,  too,  though  a 
puny  one?  So  far  as  he  knows  his  own  powers,  so 
far  as  he  knows  those  of  the  Infinite,  so  far  as  he  is 
a  creator,  his  method  mirrors  that  of  his  Creator. 

The  vital  impulse  is  finite,  it  cannot  overcome  all 
obstacles.  The  movement  it  starts  is  sometimes 
turned  aside,  sometimes  divided,  always  opposed, 
and  the  evolution  of  the  organized  world  is  the  un- 
rolling of  this  conflict.  Contingency  enters  into  the 
course  of  evolution  at  every  point.  "  Contingent  the 
arrests  and  set-backs;  contingent,  in  large  measure, 

208 


(( 


A  PROPHET  OF  THE  SOUL" 


the  adaptations."  Contingent,  he  thinks,  tlie  way 
hfe  obtains  the  solar  energy  from  the  sun,  namely 
through  the  carbon  of  carbonic  acid.  It  might  have 
obtained  it  through  other  chemical  elements  than 
oxygen  and  carbon.  In  this  case  the  element  char- 
acteristic of  the  plastic  substances  would  probably 
have  been  other  than  nitrogen,  and  the  chemistry 
of  living  bodies  would  have  been  radically  different 
from  what  it  is,  resulting  in  living  forms  without 
any  analogy  to  those  we  know,  whose  anatomy 
would  have  been  different,  whose  physiology  also 
would  have  been  different. 

It  is  therefore  probable  that  life  goes  on  in  other 
planets,  in  other  solar  systems  also,  under  forms  of 
which  we  have  no  idea,  in  physical  conditions  to 
which  it  seems  to  us,  from  the  point  of  view  of  our 
physiology,  to  be  absolutely  opposed.  All  life  re- 
quires is  slow  accumulation  of  solar  ene^g^^  and  its 
sudden  release  in  action,  and  this  accumulation  may 
take  place  in  other  systems  by  a  chemism  quite  un- 
like ours,  in  which  the  carbon  of  carlwnic  acid  is 
fixed  and  stored  up  by  the  chlorophyll ian  function 
of  plants.  Life  releases  this  energy  by  an  act  anal- 
ogous to  the  pulling  of  a  trigger,  and  the  resultant 
explosive  is  the  power  living  bodies  exert.  I  low 
figurative  and  yet  concrete  and  seeable  it  al'  is! 
Though  man  seems  to  be  the  aim  and  crown  of 
evolution,  yet  we  cannot  say  that  it  was  all  for  him. 
It  is  abundantly  evident  that  nature  is  not  solely 

20!) 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

for  the  sake  of  man ;  we  struggle  like  the  other  spe- 
cies, we  have  struggled  against  other  species ;  more- 
over, if  the  evolution  of  life  had  encountered  other 
accidents  in  its  course,  if  thereby  the  current  of  life 
had  been  otherwise  divided,  we  should  have  been 
physically  and  morally  far  different  from  what  we 
are. 

We  aim  to  look  upon  a  problem  of  science  or 
mathematics  understandingly;  we  try  to  regard  a 
work  of  art  —  a  novel,  poem,  painting,  symphony 
—  appreciatively,  to  enter  into  its  spirit,  to  become 
one  with  it,  to  possess  ourselves  of  its  point  of  view, 
in  short,  to  have  an  emotional  experience  with  it. 
The  understanding  is  less  concerned  than  our  taste, 
our  aesthetic  perceptions,  our  sympathy  with  beau- 
tiful forms,  and  our  plasticity  of  mind.  We  do  not 
know  a  work  of  art  in  the  same  way  in  which  we 
know  a  work  of  science,  or  any  product  of  analytical 
reasoning;  we  know  it  as  we  know  those  we  love 
and  are  in  sympathy  with;  it  does  not  define  itself 
to  our  intellect,  it  melts  into  our  souls.  Descriptive 
science  is  powerless  to  portray  for  me  the  bird  or  the 
flower  or  the  friend  I  love;  only  art  and  literature 
can  do  that.  Science  deals  with  fixed  concepts,  art 
with  fluid  concepts. 

This  is  Bergson's  position  as  I  understand  it. 
Living  nature  is  like  a  work  of  art,  and  our  descrip- 
tive science  fails  to  render  its  true  meaning,  or  grasp 
the  nature  of  the  evolutionary  movement.  The  feel- 

210 


« 


A  PROPHET  OF  THE  SOUI/' 


ings,  the  perception,  and  the  spiritual  insiglit  that 
go  to  the  making  and  the  appreciating  of  a  creative 
work  are  alone  equal  to  the  task. 

Resolve  all  the  processes  of  organic  nature  into 
their  mechanical  and  chemical  elements,  and  you 
have  not  got  the  secret  of  Hving  bodies  any  more 
than  you  have  got  the  secret  and  meaning  of  a  fine 
painting  by  resolving  it  into  its  original  i)igmcnts 
and  oils,  or  of  a  poem  by  cutting  up  the  words  into 
the  letters  with  which  it  is  composed. 

Bergson's  attitude  of  mind  in  "Creative  Evolu- 
tion" is  foreshadowed  in  a  passage  in  Royce's 
"Spirit  of  Modern  Philosophy."  Royce  is  speaking 
of  the  series  of  purely  physical  events  which  our 
descriptive  science  shows  us  in  evolution :  — 

Look  upon  all  these  things  descriptively,  and  you 
shall  see  nothing  but  matter  moving  instant  after  instant, 
each  instant  containing  in  its  full  description  the  neces- 
sity of  passing  over  into  the  next.  Nowhere  will  there 
be,  for  descriptive  science,  any  genuine  novelty  or  any 
discontinuity  admissible.  But  look  at  the  whole  appre- 
ciatively, historically,  synthetically,  as  a  musician  listens 
to  a  symphony,  as  a  spectator  watches  a  drama.  Now 
you  shall  seem  to  have  seen,  in  phenomenal  form,  a  story. 
Passionate  interests  will  have  been  realized. 

Bergson  reads  this  story  of  organic  evolution  in 
the  creative  and  sympathetic  way.  He  does  not 
deal  with  it  solely  through  his  equipment  as  a  man 
of  science,  but  primarily  through  his  equipment  as  a 

211 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

great  creative  artist  and  imspired  seer.  Not  intel- 
lectual analysis,  but  intellectual  sympathy,  gives 
him  the  key  to  the  problem  of  life.  Intuition  is  his 
method,  which  he  opposes  to  the  analytical  method 
of  science. 

Science  sees  the  process  of  evolution  from  the  out- 
side, as  one  might  a  train  of  cars  going  by,  and  re- 
solves it  into  the  physical  and  mechanical  elements, 
without  getting  any  nearer  the  reason  of  its  going 
by,  or  the  point  of  its  departure  or  destination.  In- 
tuition seeks  to  put  itself  inside  the  process,  and  to 
go  the  whole  way  with  it,  witnessing  its  vicissitudes 
and  viewing  the  world  in  the  light  of  its  mobility 
and  in  determinateness. 

All  the  engineering  and  architectural  and  me- 
chanical features  of  the  railway  and  its  train  of 
coaches  do  not  throw  any  light  upon  the  real  sig- 
nificance of  railways.  This  significance  must  be 
looked  for  in  the  brains  of  the  people  inside  the 
coaches  and  in  the  push  of  the  civilization  of  which 
they  are  some  of  the  expressions.  In  like  manner 
when  we  have  reduced  biological  processes  to  their 
mechanical  and  chemical  equivalents,  we  are  as  far 
as  ever  from  the  true  nature  and  significance  of 
biology. 

Organic  evolution  is  something  more  than  an  illus- 
tration of  the  working  of  the  laws  of  dead  matter. 
A  living  body  is  the  sum  of  its  physicochemical 
factors,  plus  something  else.   The  dead  automatic 

212 


"A  PROPHET  OF  THE  SOUL" 

forces  of  the  earth  went  their  round  of  ceaseless 
change  for  untold  ages  without  escaping  from  the 
grip  of  mechanical  necessity  in  which  they  were 
held;  then  there  came  a  time  when  the  spell  was 
broken  and  the  current  of  life  arose.  We  have  to 
speak  of  the  event  in  this  anthropomorphic  way,  as 
if  it  were  an  event,  as  if  there  were  discontinuity 
somewhere,  as  if  the  creative  spirit  began  its  work  as 
we  begin  ours.  But  evidently  life  did  not  begin  in 
our  human,  practical  sense,  any  more  than  the  line 
we  call  a  circle  begins,  or  any  more  than  the  sphere 
has  ends  and  boundaries.  Our  logical  faculties,  cast 
in  the  moulds  of  our  experience,  fail  to  grasp  these 
problems.  Life  15,  and,  in  some  inscrutable  way, 
always  has  been,  and  always  will  be,  because  it  is 
one  with  the  cosmic  spirit. 

IV 

One  phase  of  this  new  world  which  Bergson*s 
"Creative  Evolution"  opens  to  us  is  this  play  and 
interplay  of  spirit  and  matter,  or  this  struggle  for 
the  mastery,  or  shall  I  say  for  the  union  between 
them,  of  which  organic  evolution  is  the  drama  —  a 
real  drama  unfolding  throughout  the  biologic  ages, 
with  vicissitudes,  failures,  and  successes.  We  see 
the  current  of  life,  spirit,  consciousness,  making  its 
way  through  matter,  struggling  with  it,  hampered 
and  retarded  by  it,  as  a  stream  wearing  its  channel 
through  the  soil  wastes  itself  and  is  delayed,  divided, 

213 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

but  ever  onward  flowing  by  reason  of  its  essential 
mobility.  The  branchings  and  the  imfoldings  of  Hfe 
in  the  process  of  evolution  have  been  contingent  and 
indeterminate  in  the  same  way  —  inevitable,  but 
plastic,  yielding,  accommodating,  taking  what  they 
could  get  and  ever  reaching  out  for  more.  Life  has 
succeeded,  but  its  triumph  has  not  been  complete. 
It  has  been  very  human  and  fallible.  Indeed,  it  is 
the  complete  humanization  of  life  that  makes  Berg- 
son's  conception  so  pleasing  and  stimulating.  It  is 
the  taking  of  it  out  of  the  realm  of  mechanical  neces- 
sity or  fatality,  and  the  surrounding  of  it  with  the 
atmosphere  of  the  humanly  finite  and  contingent, 
that  is  new  in  philosophy.  I  hardly  know  why  we 
should  wish  to  believe  that  what  we  have  always 
called  God  should  have  its  problems  and  difficulties 
and  setbacks,  as  we  do,  unless  it  helps  us  the  better 
to  understand  the  failures  and  imperfections  in  the 
world  —  the  condition  of  struggle  and  unrealized 
ideals  that  is  the  common  lot  of  mankind,  and,  in  a 
measure,  of  all  that  lives.  The  soul  dreams  of  perfec- 
tion, but  it  is  hampered  and  defeated  by  the  body  it 
animates;  so  did,  or  does,  the  Cosmic  Spirit,  but  the 
obduracy  of  the  matter  through  which  it  works  makes 
it  fall  short  of  the  perfection  at  which  it  aims. 

There  are  two  short  sentences  in  Bergson  which 
hold  the  key  to  his  philosophy.  "Living  nature," 
he  says,  "is  more  and  better  than  a  plan  in  course 
of  realization";  and  again,  "Everything  is  obscure 

214 


"A  PROPHET  OF  THE  SOUL" 

in  the  idea  of  creation  if  we  think  of  things  that  arc 
created,  and  a  thing  that  creates."  Such  views  are 
the  work  of  our  practical  intellect.  When  we  see  a 
house  we  think  of  the  builder,  when  we  see  a  walch 
we  infer  the  maker,  and  this  attribute  of  mind  is 
necessary  to  our  successful  dealing  with  concrete 
things;  but  in  organic  nature  the  house  and  the 
watch  are  always  being  made,  and  every  day  is  a 
day  of  creation;  the  forms  of  life  are  like  the  clouds 
in  the  summer  sky,  ever  and  never  the  same;  the 
vital  currents  flow  forever,  and  we  rise  to  the  surface 
like  changing,  iridescent  bubbles  that  dance  and 
play  for  a  moment,  and  are  succeeded  by  others,  and 
ever  others.  The  vital  impulse  absorbs  Bergson's 
attention,  "not  things  made,  but  things  in  the  mak- 
ing; not  self -maintaining  states,  but  only  changing 
states.  Rest  is  never  more  than  apparent,  or,  rather, 
relative."  This  is  the  way  Bergson  gets  rid  of  the 
old  conception  of  design  and  finalism  in  nature.  He 
thinks  of  the  creative  impulse  or  tendency  in  terms 
of  the  mobile,  the  incalculable,  the  ever-changing. 

Life  hovers  forever  between  the  stable  and  the 
unstable.  We  cannot  describe  it  in  terms  of  the 
fixed,  the  geometric.  Motion  is  not  in  place,  it  is 
in  transition  —  neither  here  nor  there,  but  forever 
between  the  two.  Our  bodies  are  like  the  clouds, 
ever  and  never  the  same.  Hence  our  conception  of 
life  seems  a  contradiction,  or  two  contraries  united, 
which  seems  one  absurdity;   an  ascending  and   a 

215 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

descending  current  balanced,  a  perpetual  explosion, 
integration  and  disintegration  going  hand  in  hand. 

The  effort  of  matter  and  force  in  the  inorganic 
world  is  to  find  a  stable  equilibrium;  their  effort  in 
the  organic  world  is  to  find  an  unstable  equilibrium, 
to  hang  forever,  as  it  were,  on  the  pitch  of  the  tor- 
rent, suspended  between  mobility  and  immobility, 
constantly  passing  from  one  to  the  other.  Life  is 
an  interchange  of  the  two,  the  perpetual  translation 
and  transformation  of  the  immobile  into  the  mobile. 
The  effort  of  the  inorganic  forces  to  find  a  stable 
equilibrium  gives  us  all  the  forms  of  mechanical 
energy  and  shapes  the  surface  of  the  globe;  the  ef- 
forts of  the  organic  to  find  and  hold  a  state  of  un- 
stable equilibrium  give  us  all  the  forms  of  life. 
Gravity  rules  in  one.  What  rules  in  and  determines 
the  other? 

One  may  think  of  Bergson's  conception  of  a  living 
body  under  various  images.  I  am  reminded  of  it 
when  I  see  at  the  fountain  a  little  ball  dancing  in  the 
air  at  the  top  of  a  slender  column  of  water  —  the 
upward  push  just  balancing  the  downward  pull  of 
gravity,  and  the  ball  playing  and  hovering  perpetu- 
ally. It  is  mobility  and  stability  equalized.  Dimin- 
ish the  force  of  the  upward  current  and  the  ball  sinks 
and  sinks  till  it  lies  motionless  at  the  bottom.  So, 
when  the  pressure  of  life  goes  down,  the  living  body 
fails  and  fails,  overcome  by  the  opposite  tendency, 
till  death  ensues. 

216 


« 


A  PROPHET  OF  THE  SOUL" 


One  may  think  of  it  under  the  image  of  the  bow 
in  the  clouds,  so  frail  and  fugitive,  yet  apparently 
so  permanent.  It  is  not  involved  in  the  fate  of  the 
raindrops  through  which  it  is  manifested.  They  fall 
but  it  does  not.  It  is  ceaselessly  renewed;  it  hangs 
forever  on  the  verge  of  dissolution.  If  the  sun  is 
veiled  it  is  gone;  if  the  rain  ceases  it  is  gone.  Its 
source  is  not  in  the  rain,  but  is  inseparable  from  it. 
So  matter  is  only  the  seat  of  life,  not  its  source.  Its 
final  source  is  in  the  elan  vital,  as  the  source  of  the 
rainbow  is  in  the  sun.  The  sunbeams  still  pour 
through  space  whether  they  encounter  raindrops 
or  not. 

Bergson  thinks  that  consciousness,  or  the  soul,  is 
not  involved  in  the  fate  of  the  brain,  though  mo- 
mentarily dependent  upon  it.  The  true  way  in 
which  to  regard  the  hfe  of  the  body  is  to  postulate 
that  it  is  on  the  road  which  leads  to  the  life  of  the 
spirit.  Souls,  he  says,  are  continually  being  created, 
which  nevertheless,  in  a  certain  sense,  preexisted  in 
the  cosmic  spirits  as  the  bow  preexisted  in  the  sun. 

V 

In  a  limited  sense  Darwin  was  a  creative  evolu- 
tionist also;  in  his  view  nothing  in  animal  life  was 
fixed  or  stereotyped;  ceaseless  change,  ceaseless 
development  marked  its  whole  course  through  the 
geologic  ages;  his  animal  series  is  as  mobile,  or  as 
much  a  flowing  current,  as  Bergson's;  species  give 

217 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

rise  to  other  species  through  the  accumulation  of 
insensible  variations,  but  Darwin  looked  upon  the 
whole  process  as  mechanical  and  fortuitous.  He  did 
not  hit  upon  any  adequate  reason  for  variation  itself. 

It  has  been  aptly  said  that  while  natural  selection 
may  account  for  the  survival  of  the  fittest,  it  does 
not  account  for  the  arrival  of  the  fittest.  In  Dar- 
win's scheme,  Nature  was  always  blindly  experi- 
menting and  then  profiting  by  her  lucky  strokes,  but 
why  she  should  experiment,  why  she  should  try  to 
improve  upon  her  old  models,  what  it  was  and  is  in 
the  evolutionary  process  that  struggles  and  aspires 
and  pushes  on  and  on,  did  not  enter  into  Darwin's 
scheme.  He  did  not  share  the  Bergsonian  concep- 
tion of  life  as  a  primordial  creative  impulse  flowing 
through  matter.  This  were  to  transcend  the  sphere 
of  legitimate  scientific  inquiry  to  which  he  applied 
himself.  As  living  forms  had  to  begin  somewhere, 
somehow,  Darwin  starts  with  the  act  of  the  Creator 
breathing  the  breath  of  life  into  one  or  into  a  few 
forms,  and  then  through  the  operation  of  the  laws 
which  the  same  Creator  impressed  upon  matter,  the 
whole  drama  of  organic  evolution  follows.  Second- 
ary causes,  by  which  he  seems  to  mean  the  laws  of 
matter  and  force,  complete  the  work  begun  by  the 
Creator. 

After  all,  the  differences  between  Darwin's  and 
Bergson's  views  of  evolution  are  not  fundamental. 
They  conceive  of  the  creative  energy  under  different 

218 


"A  PROPHET  OF  THE  SOUL" 

symbols,  and  as  working  in  different  ways,  but  it  is 
finally,  in  both  cases,  the  same  energy.  Whether 
living  beings  are  evolved  as  the  result  of  laws  im- 
pressed upon  matter  at  the  first,  or  whether  they 
arise  by  the  ceaseless  activity  of  a  psychic  principle 
launched  into  matter,  at  a  definite  time  and  place, 
as  Bergson  teaches,  is  mainly  a  difference  in  the  use 
of  terms.  Both  theories  start  from  the  same  centre; 
they  diverge  only  as  they  are  worked  out  toward  the 
periphery.  Darwin  conceives  of  primary  and  sec- 
ondary causes,  Bergson  conceives  of  an  original 
creative  spirit,  ceaselessly  struggling  to  evolve  living 
forms  out  of  inert  matter.  Creation  as  a  special 
event  is  a  past  history  with  Darwin;  it  is  an  ever- 
present  event  with  Bergson.  New  species  are  acci- 
dental with  Darwin,  they  are  contingent  and  unfore- 
seeable with  Bergson;  the  creative  impulse,  like  the 
genius  of  the  creative  artist,  does  not  know  the  form 
it  is  looking  for  till  it  has  found  it;  on  other  planets, 
amid  other  conditions,  evolution  may  result  in  quite 
other  forms. 

When  I  try  to  conceive  of  Darwin's  laws  im- 
pressed upon  matter,  I  can  see  only  the  creative 
energy  immanent  in  matter.  I  see  the  Han  vital  of 
Bergson  framed  in  another  concept.  When  I  recall 
the  famous  utterance  of  Tyndall  in  his  Belfast  ad- 
dress of  over  thirty  years  ago,  —  namely,  that  in 
matter  itself  he  saw  the  promise  and  the  potency 
of  all   terrestrial   life,  —  I   see,  in   another   guise, 

219 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

Bergson's  principle  of  creative  evolution.  How  mat- 
ter came  to  have  this  power,  Tyndall  says  he  never 
ventm*es  to  inquire.  Elsewhere  he  speaks  of  the 
primeval  union  between  spirit  and  matter.  The  sci- 
entific mind,  like  Tyndall's,  so  conversant,  with  the 
protean  forms  hidden  in  matter,  and  so  moulded  by 
the  method  of  verification,  hesitates  to  take  the  step 
which  the  more  philosophical  and  imaginative  mind, 
like  Bergson's,  takes  readily  and  boldly.  But 
whether  we  conceive  of  the  final  mystery  of  life  as 
hidden  in  the  molecular  mechanics  of  Tyndall  and 
Huxley,  or  in  the  entelechy  of  Driesch,  or  in  the 
elan  vital  of  Bergson,  it  seems  to  me  makes  little  dif- 
ference. Life  is  a  species  of  activity  set  up  by  some- 
thing in  inert  substance,  as  unique  and  individual  as 
that  set  up  by  heat  or  electricity,  or  chemical  affin- 
ity, and  far  less  amenable  to  our  analysis.  As  so 
many  of  its  phenomena,  such  as  metabolism,  repro- 
duction, assimilation,  adaptation,  elude  all  interpre- 
tation in  terms  of  exact  science,  we  can  only  appeal 
to  philosophy  or  to  teleology  —  to  the  light  that 
never  was  on  sea  or  land  —  for  an  explanation.  And 
when  we  invoke  the  light  that  never  was  on  sea  or 
land,  positive  science  turns  its  back  and  will  have 
none  of  it.  Things  not  on  sea  or  land  have  no  place 
in  its  categories.  But  Bergson  is  full  of  this  light,  it 
radiates  from  nearly  every  page,  and  this  is  one 
great  source  of  his  charm,  and  of  his  power  to 
quicken  the  spirit.  It  is  his  art,  his  vision,  the  witch- 

£20 


(( 


A  PROPHET  OF  THE  SOUL" 


ery  of  his  style,  the  freedom  and  ehisticity  of  his 
thought,  and  not  the  net  result  of  his  philosophical 
speculations,  that  carry  him,  as  a  prophet  and  an 
interpreter  of  nature,  so  much  beyond  the  sphere  of 
Darwin  and  Spencer  and  Tyndall. 

Thus  at  the  centre  of  their  conceptions,  at  the 
point  from  which  they  start,  our  natural  philos- 
ophers do  not  seem  to  differ  radically.  They  all 
begin  with  life  in  some  form,  hidden  somewhere  in 
matter.    There  is  no  dead  matter. 

All  our  philosophers  look  to  the  sun  as  the  source 
of  the  energy  which  the  organism  uses  and  mani- 
fests. But  M.  Bergson  fixes  his  attention  upon  life 
as  something  working  in  the  organism  and  releasing 
at  will  the  energy  which  the  organism  has  stored  up. 
There  is  always  in  his  scheme  this  free  agent  or 
being,  called  Life  or  Consciousness,  which  works  its 
will  upon  matter,  while  with  Tyndall  and  Huxley 
and  Haeckel  attention  is  fixed  upon  this  mysterious 
force  which  they  conceive  of  as  potential  in  the  ulti- 
mate particles  of  matter  itself.  Out  of  this  force 
comes  life;  vitality  is  in  some  way  identified  with 
molecular  physics,  matter  has  no  forward  impulse 
or  current  as  Bergson  conceives  it,  but  the  phe- 
nomena of  life  appear  when  the  atoms  and  corpus- 
cles are  compounded  in  certain  proportions  and  in  a 
certain  order.  One  sees  a  psychic  principle  launched 
into  matter  where  the  other  sees  mechanical  and 
chemical  principles;  one  humanizes  a  force,   and 

221 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

makes  it  of  the  order  "willed";  the  other  dehuman- 
izes it,  and  makes  it  of  the  order  "automatic." 
Both  deal  with  mysteries,  but  one  is  a  human  or 
spiritual  mystery,  the  other  a  scientific  mystery;  one 
puts  a  Creator  behind  nature,  the  other  finds  a  cre- 
ator in  nature,  but  calls  it  molecular  attraction  and 
repulsion.  Tyndall  pays  homage  to  the  mystery 
that  lies  back  of  all,  M.  Bergson  pays  homage  to  the 
freedom  and  plasticity,  the  creative  activity  of  all. 
A  mechanical  movement  is  translation,  a  vital 
movement  is  transformation.  In  Bergson's  scheme 
every  living  thing  is  creating  itself  continually;  this 
creation  of  self  by  self  for  self  is  what  separates  liv- 
ing matter  from  the  non-living  by  a  gulf.  The  life- 
process  is  indivisible,  it  is  whole  every  moment.  It  is 
symbolized  by  the  curve,  which  returns  forever  into 
itself,  and  a  curve  is  no  more  made  up  of  straight 
lines  than  life  is  made  of  physicochemical  elements. 
The  intellect  working  through  science  can  only  ex- 
plain the  genesis  of  life  in  terms  of  physics  and 
chemistry.  "Analysis  will  undoubtedly  resolve  the 
process  of  organic  creation  into  an  ever-growing 
number  of  physicochemical  phenomena,  and  chem- 
ists and  physicists  will  have  to  do,  of  course,  with 
nothing  but  these.  But  it  does  not  follow  that  chem- 
istry and  physics  will  ever  give  us  the  key  of  life." 
To  get  a  correct  notion  of  life  we  must  break  with 
scientific  habits  of  thought,  we  must  "  go  counter  to 
the  natural  bent  of  the  intellect." 

2-22 


"A  PROPHET  OF  THE  SOUI/' 

Is  one's  own  apprehension  of  the  truth  of  tho5o 
distinctions  of  M,  Bergson's  intuitional  or  logical? 
In  my  own  case  I  feel  that  it  would  be  hard  to  give 
logical  reasons  why  I  believe  that  we  are  nearer  the 
truth  when  we  think  of  life  under  the  image  of  a 
curve,  than  under  the  image  of  a  right  line;  or  why 
I  see  that  nature's  method  is  an  all-round  method, 
like  the  circle,  while  man's  is  a  direct  method  like  a 
straight  line.  We  seem  driven  to  the  conclusion  that 
all  transcendental  truth  —  truth  that  transcends 
our  reason  and  experience  —  comes  by  way  of  the 
intuitions.  The  daring  affirmations  of  a  writer  like 
Emerson  —  the  very  electricity  of  thought  —  are 
intuitional.  The  great  truths  in  Whitman,  shining 
like  beacon  lights  all  through  his  rugged  lines,  cos- 
mic truths  of  the  moral  nature,  —  one  may  call  them 
glimpses  into  the  depths  profound  of  the  moral  uni- 
verse, —  he  never  came  at  by  any  logical  or  ratio- 
cinative  process.  "Logic  and  sermons  never  con- 
vince," he  says.  "The  damp  of  the  night  drives 
deeper  into  my  soul."  They  are  truths  of  the  intui- 
tions. M.  Bergson's  conceptions  of  life  seem  to 
transcend  logic  and  reason  in  the  same  way. 

VI 

Probably  never  before  was  there  so  successful  an 
attempt  to  reconcile  contradictions,  to  make  the 
difficult,  not  to  say  the  impossible,  the  easier  way. 
It  is  so  easy  to  prove  determinism,   fatalism;  no 

2^23 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

difficult  to  see  the  road  to  free  will,  liberty,  and  the 
ascendancy  of  the  spirit.  The  weight  of  the  whole 
material  world  is  on  the  side  of  determinism.  All  om* 
intellectual  and  logical  faculties  are  trained  in  this 
school;  we  can  act  successfully  upon  matter  only 
when  we  regard  it  as  held  in  the  leash  of  irrefragable 
law;  through  the  conceptions  of  geometry  and  me- 
chanics we  conquer  and  use  the  material  world.  Our 
civilization  is  the  product  of  these  conceptions.  Any 
indeterminism,  any  inexactness,  in  measurements 
and  calculations,  any  of  the  freedom  of  life  admitted 
into  our  dealings  with  matter  and  force,  and  we 
come  or  may  come  to  grief.  If  we  built  our  houses  as 
we  often  build  our  arguments,  they  would  fall  upon 
our  heads.  But  Bergson's  philosophy  does  not  fall 
upon  our  heads,  because  it  is  buoyant  with  spirit;  it 
is  not  a  mere  framework  of  logical  concepts;  it  is  a 
living  and  not  a  dead  philosophy;  it  is  more  like  a 
tree  rooted  in  the  soil,  not  a  framework  of  inert 
ideas.  It  is  Gothic  rather  than  classic;  its  symbols 
and  suggestions  are  in  living  things. 

I  can  fancy  how  like  a  dream  or  the  shadow  of 
a  dream  all  this  may  seem  to  the  rigidly  scientific 
mind  —  the  mind  that  has  always  dealt  with  the 
solid  facts  and  the  measurable  forces  of  the  mechan- 
ical world.  And  science,  as  such,  can  deal  with  no 
other.  Its  analysis  necessarily  kills  living  matter, 
and  when  it  deals  with  the  living  animal  none  of  its 
vital  functions  fall  within  the  sphere  of  the  mechan- 

224 


"A  PROPHET  OF  THE  SOUL" 

ical  and  chemical  categories.  When  it  tries  to  for- 
mulate the  psychic,  it  finds  itself  dealing  with  the 
vague,  the  unforeseeable.  What  is  true  of  the  psy- 
chosis of  one  animal  is  not  always  true  of  another  of 
the  same  species.  As  soon  as  we  enter  the  sphere 
of  life,  we  enter  the  sphere  of  the  variable,  the  incal- 
culable, the  supra-mechanical;  and  when  we  enter 
the  sphere  of  mind,  the  doors  of  the  unstable  and 
unpredictable  are  thrown  still  wider  open. 

In  theory  Bergson  says  it  is  a  kind  of  absurdity  to 
try  to  know  otherwise  than  by  intelligence  or  reason. 
How  can  intelligence  go  beyond  intelligence?  Is  not 
all  this  step  of  setting  bonds  to  intelligence  taken  by 
the  aid  of  the  very  faculty  to  which  we  prescribe 
limits.'^  By  life  alone  is  the  contradiction  solved.  As 
in  swimming,  action,  the  fearless  plunge,  cuts  the 
knot;  and  we  swim  by  the  same  members  we  walk 
with.  A  man  can  lift  himself  over  the  fence  if  he 
uses  the  fence  as  a  fulcrum,  and  life  can  overcome 
matter  when  it  enters  into  it  and  uses  it. 

Our  scientific  faculties  will  carry  us  through  the 
inorganic  world  and  unfold  for  us  the  processes 
of  inorganic  evolution,  the  foundation  of  all  suns 
and  systems,  and  they  will  account  for  the  present 
state  of  the  earth  on  physical  and  chemical  princi- 
ples, and  can  with  reasonable  confidence  forecast  its 
state  or  condition  in  the  far  distant  future.  But 
when  it  comes  to  the  living  world,  those  faculties  are 
baffled;  when  they  pass  from  the  astronomic  and  the 

225 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

geologic  to  the  biologic,  their  mathematics  and  their 
physics  do  not  go  very  far.  They  can  analyze  many 
of  the  life-processes  and  milock  many  secrets  with 
their  mechanical  and  chemical  principles,  but  they 
cannot  account  for  life  itself,  they  cannot  reduce 
vital  functions  to  scientific  categories;  they  cannot 
account  for  the  mind,  for  consciousness,  nor  show  us 
the  relation  of  thought  to  matter.  Here  some  sort  of 
philosophy  is  necessary,  and  here  arise  the  scientific 
philosophers,  like  Spencer  and  others,  and  offer  us 
their  guesses  or  interpretations.  Each  and  all  take  a 
leap  in  the  dark;  their  science  fails  them  and  their 
philosophy  comes  to  their  aid.  Many  of  the  physical 
objects  of  life  can  be  dealt  with  by  science,  but  its 
psychic  aspects  cannot  be  so  dealt  with;  a  science 
of  psychology  is  impossible.  Biophysics  are  not  the 
same  as  geophysics;  there  is  a  new,  unknown  factor 
to  be  dealt  with.  Evolution  is  not  a  mere  process;  it 
is  a  progress;  it  is  not  a  circle,  but  a  spiral. 

"  Creative  Evolution  "  is  likely  to  live  as  literature 
even  though  it  should  be  discredited  as  philosophy. 
Attacked  its  philosophy  of  course  will  be,  and  has 
been.  But  vitalized  by  such  a  style  and  humanized 
by  such  a  spirit  so  in  fellowship  with  the  highest 
emotions  and  aspirations  of  the  soul,  Bergson's  phi- 
losophy, I  think,  stands  a  better  chance  of  surviving 
than  any  other  system  of  our  time.  It  is  a  proclama- 
tion of  emancipation  to  minds  in  the  bondage  of 
materialism  and  mechanism.   It  makes  free  as  the 

22Q 


"A  PROniET  OF  THE  SOUL" 

spirit  alone  can  make  free.  Coming  to  his  work  from 
the  dry,  arid  pages  of  Spencer,  for  example,  is  like 
coming  from  the  atmosphere  of  a  great  manufac- 
turing-plant to  the  air  of  the  summer  hilltops.  It 
leavens  what  to  many  minds  is  the  heavy  world 
of  scientific  matter  with  the  leaven  of  the  spirit. 
Bergson  is  an  inspired  man,  and  he  begets  in  us  that 
inward  joy  and  exultation  which  is  the  gift  alone  of 
"a  prophet  of  the  soul." 


XIII 
LIFE  AND  CHANCE 

I 

CHANCE,  as  we  commonly  use  the  word,  plays 
an  important  part  in  all  om*  lives  and  in  the 
lives  of  all  other  creatures.  According  to  a  recent 
writer  it  plays  an  important  part  in  the  present  great 
European  war,  or  in  Great  Britain's  relation  to  it. 
"Chance,"  he  says,  "located  nearly  all  the  available 
harbors  on  the  English  side  of  the  Channel.  Chance 
made  it  necessary  for  sailing  ships  to  hug  the  Eng- 
lish coast  and  to  utilize  English  harbors  in  case  of 
storm;  chance  provided  winds  and  currents  so  vari- 
able that  large  fleets  seldom  found  conditions  favor- 
able for  the  crossing  of  the  Channel,  the  result  being 
that  only  three  of  about  fifty  attempts  to  invade 
England  succeeded."  Chance  in  this  sense  has  been 
one  of  the  prime  factors  in  all  history  and  is  a  prime 
factor  in  our  individual  lives.  So  much  that  we  are 
and  do  is  contingent  upon  outward  conditions  over 
which  we  have  no  control.  Where  the  laws  and 
movements  of  inorganic  nature  come  into  play,  our 
power  of  choice  is  negatived.  We  apply  the  word 
"chance  "  to  these  things,  because  they  are  not  pur- 
posive, they  serve  no  special  end,  they  are  the  result 

228 


LIFE  AND  CHANCE 

of  the  action  of  irrefragable  law.  Hence  chance  in 
the  physical  world  is  but  another  name  for  fatalism. 
The  non-living,  material  bodies  are  in  the  grip  of 
irrefragable  laws.  Toss  a  stone  from  your  hand,  and 
if  we  knew  all  the  forces  acting  upon  it,  we  could  tell 
the  precise  point  where  it  would  strike  the  earth ;  we 
may  say  that  it  was  foreordained  from  the  founda- 
tions of  the  world  just  where  it  should  fall.  "Law- 
less as  snowflakes"  is  a  phrase  used  by  Rousseau 
and  then  by  Whitman,  but  snowflakes  in  their  for- 
mation obey  their  own  law  of  crystallization,  and,  in 
their  descent  to  the  ground,  obey  the  forces  of  the 
air  acting  upon  them.  They  are  lawless  to  us  be- 
cause we  do  not  see  the  forces  that  control  them. 
The  same  fate  or  necessity  rules  throughout  all  inor- 
ganic nature,  and  it  rules  in  the  world  of  living  bod- 
ies, so  far  as  those  bodies  are  in  the  grip  of  physical 
laws.  What  seems  more  lawless  than  the  falling 
leaves  of  autumn,  or  the  grains  of  pollen  which  the 
flowering  trees  and  plants  cast  upon  the  air.'*  But 
they  are  all  as  strictly  under  the  control  of  phj^sical 
forces  as  are  the  snowflakes,  or  the  driving  drops  of 
rain,  or  the  breaking  waves  upon  the  beach.  When 
two  celestial  bodies  collide,  as  now  and  then  hap- 
pens, it  seems  from  our  point  of  view  purely  acci- 
dental, as  much  so  as  when  two  persons  collide  upon 
the  sidewalk.  In  the  former  case,  if  the  astronomer 
knew  all  the  forces  at  work,  he  could  figure  out  just 
where  and  when  the  collision  would  occur,  as  accu- 

229 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

rately  as  he  calculates  when  an  eclipse  of  the  sun  or 
the  moon  will  occur,  and  where  upon  the  earth's  sur- 
face it  will  be  visible.  But  in  the  case  of  the  two 
persons  colliding  upon  the  sidewalk,  are  any  data 
possible  that  would  enable  us  to  anticipate  such  a 
collision?  If  we  knew  their  past  lives  to  the  minutest 
detail,  and  their  present  occupations  and  their  tem- 
peraments and  dispositions,  could  we  foresee  when 
and  where  the  encounter  would  take  place?  Huxley, 
who  in  his  philosophy  was  a  fatalist,  and  thought 
that  if  we  had  all  the  data  that  entered  into  the 
problem,  purely  human  events  could  be  forecast  as 
accurately  as  could  physical  events,  would  say  yes. 
M.  Bergson  and  his  school,  who  hold  that  life  adds 
to  matter  a  psychological  principle,  —  something  in- 
determinate and  incalculable  that  frees  it  from  the 
fatalism  of  mechanical  laws,  —  would  say  no.  In 
human  life  the  material  is,  in  a  measure,  under  the 
control  of  the  psychical,  and  the  psychical  is  not 
bound  by  the  rigid  law  of  causation,  as  is  the  physi- 
cal. This  conclusion  involves  a  super-scientific  step 
which  the  rigidly  scientific  mind  hesitates  to  take. 
But  Sir  Oliver  Lodge  does  not  hesitate  to  take  it, 
though  he  is  one  of  the  leading  physicists  of  his  day. 
Indeed,  Sir  Oliver  takes  so  many  steps  in  that  direc- 
tion —  such  tremendous  strides,  one  may  say  — 
that  he  is  seriously  discredited  among  his  scientific 
brethren.  His  conception  of  a  hierarchy  of  spirits 
that  govern  the  universe  savors  of  the  remote  pre- 

^0 


LIFE  AND  CHANCE 

scientific  ages.  But  the  belief  that  the  mystery  of 
life  involves  other  forces  than  the  purely  material 
ones  —  forces  whose  action  cannot  be  foreseen  or 
measured  —  is  a  proposition  that  exact  science  has 
not  rendered  and  probably  never  can  render  in- 
credible. 

The  more  by  searching  we  find  out  the  true  in- 
wardness of  matter,  the  nearer  we  find  ourselves  to 
the  borderland  of  the  unknowable,  the  transcen- 
dental, the  incalculable.  It  appears  more  and  more 
as  if  we  might  still  be  men  of  science  and  yet  keep 
the  words  "soul,"  "spirit,"  "creation,"  "spon- 
taneity," and  the  like  as  standing  for  real  truths  in 
the  total  scheme  of  things.  I  do  not  think  those  per- 
sons overcredulous  who  hold  that  human  life  in  its 
most  material  aspects  is  not  entirely  a  matter  of 
chemical  reactions  and  mechanical  transpositions. 

We  apply  the  word  "chance"  to  those  events  or 
happenings  in  our  lives  that  were  not  designed  or 
foreseen.  In  our  good  luck  and  bad  luck  our  wills 
are  not  consciously  concerned.  The  famous  apple 
that  fell  upon  Newton's  head  was  a  chance  hit, 
though  its  falling  was  the  result  of  the  action  of 
immutable  law;  but  Newton's  position  in  the  line  of 
the  apple's  fall  was,  so  far  as  his  will  was  concerned, 
a  matter  of  chance.  Here  a  new  factor  comes  in,  the 
incalculable  behavior  of  a  living  body.  We  cannot 
bring  its  activities  to  book  as  we  can  the  movements 
of  a  non-living  body.   Yet  up  to  a  certain  point 

231 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

living  matter  is  in  the  grip  of  the  same  physical  laws 
as  the  non-living  —  inertia,  gravity,  friction,  me- 
chanical and  chemical  principles  play  the  same  part. 
There  are  not  two  sets  of  physical  laws,  one  for  the 
living  and  one  for  the  non-living,  but  into  the  move- 
ments of  the  former,  even  the  humblest,  there  enters 
another  principle  which  is  not  in  the  same  sense 
amenable  to  physical  law.  A  purposive  act  may  use 
gravity,  but  its  genesis  is  above  and  beyond  gravity. 
I  cannot  walk  across  the  room  without  the  aid  of 
gravity,  but  gravity  has  nothing  to  do  with  the  mo- 
tive that  sets  me  moving.  The  chemical  reactions  in 
my  body  are  the  same  as  those  outside  my  body, 
only  there  are  far  more  of  them,  and  they  are  of 
greater  complexity,  but  the  purposeful  organs  and 
activities  in  the  living  are  unknown  in  the  non- 
living world. 

We  call  that  fortuitous  or  accidental  in  which  we 
see  no  purpose  or  design.  The  shape  of  the  rocks, 
the  lines  of  the  hills,  the  course  of  the  streams,  are 
matters  of  chance.  They  are  not  purposive.  The 
whole  earth's  surface,  the  distribution  of  land  and 
water,  of  mountain  and  plain,  is  in  this  sense  acci- 
dental, though  the  result  of  the  action  and  inter- 
action of  unimpeachable  physical  laws.  Given  the 
conditions  and  the  forces  at  work,  these  things  could 
not  have  been  otherwise,  though  being  otherwise 
would  have  made  no  difference  in  the  total  result. 
(Of  course,  a  different  distribution  of  the  land  and 

232 


LIFE  AND  CILVNCE 

water  upon  the  globe  would  have  made  a  vast  differ- 
ence in  the  distribution  of  life  upon  the  globe,  but 
not  to  the  non-living  bodies.)  A  natural  bridge  in 
the  rocky  strata,  the  rude  architectural  and  monu- 
mental forms  in  the  rocks  of  the  Southwest,  are 
purely  matters  of  chance,  in  the  sense  in  which  I  am 
using  the  word.  But  the  forms  of  vegetation  and 
of  animal  life  are  not  in  the  same  sense  accidental; 
they  are  purposive.  All  the  parts  of  a  living  body 
are  subordinated  to  the  whole.  Hence  it  possesses  a 
unity  in  the  sense  that  a  non-living  body  does  not. 
The  unity  and  subordination  of  parts  of  a  machine 
are  given  to  it  by  the  builder,  and  are  not  an  evolu- 
tion from  within. 

The  question  whether  the  beginning  of  life  upon 
the  globe  was  itself  accidental  —  a  fortuitous  chem- 
ical reaction  —  is  a  question  upon  which  our  natural 
philosophers  are  divided.  In  this  whole  problem  the 
accidental  and  the  purposive  seem  so  blended  that 
it  is  a  difficult  matter  to  find  our  way  between  them. 
The  mechanistic  conception  of  life,  which  is  winning 
more  and  more  acceptance  among  scientific  men, 
looks  upon  it  as  accidental,  as  truly  so  as  are  the 
sparks  struck  out  by  two  colliding  bodies.  In  this 
view  man  himself  is  as  much  the  result  of  the  action 
of  the  blind,  irrational  forces  which  we  see  in  the 
inorganic  realm  about  us  as  are  the  rains  and  the 
dews,  the  winds  and  the  tides.  Given  the  elements 
and  the  physical  laws  about  us  and  these  things  are 

233 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

inevitable.  Is  life  inevitable  in  the  same  sense?  Was 
it  predetermined  in  the  constitution  of  matter  and 
its  laws?  One  cannot  say  that  the  profile  in  the  rocks 
was  predetermined  in  this  sense  —  only  the  possi- 
bility of  it.  The  conjunction  of  circumstances  that 
gave  life  to  the  globe,  the  mechanists  would  say  was 
a  matter  of  chance;  this  specific  conjunction  might 
never  have  happened,  or  might  have  been  vastly 
delayed,  or  accelerated,  as  maybe  it  was.  But  the 
law  of  probability  would  sooner  or  later  have 
brought  it  about.  The  law  of  probability  will  in 
time,  or  in  eternity,  throw  our  earth  into  the  arms 
of  a  comet,  and  our  sun  against  another  sun  coursing 
in  space.  If  celestial  bodies  collide  once,  then  they 
will  collide  twice,  and  thrice,  and  ten  thousand 
times;  so  if  the  conjunction  of  matter  that  resulted 
in  life  happened  once,  it  will  happen  again,  and  may 
have  happened  any  number  of  times  in  the  past 
history  of  the  cosmos. 

It  is  quite  certain  that  there  could  have  been  no 
man  and  none  of  the  higher  forms  of  vertebrate  life, 
had  not  the  land  risen  above  the  sea.  There  is 
enough  water  on  the  globe  to  cover  all  the  land- 
areas  at  a  depth  of  two  miles.  With  the  continents 
thus  submerged,  of  course  the  present  forms  of  ter- 
restrial life  could  not  have  developed,  and  if  we  look 
upon  this  elevation  of  the  land  above  the  sea  as  a 
matter  of  chance,  —  the  result  of  the  hit-and-miss 
warring  of  the  purely  mechanical  forces,  —  then  is 

234 


LIFE  AND  CHANCE 

man  to  that  extent  involved  in  these  contingencies. 
In  this  sense  I  think  all  terrestrial  life  is  accidental. 
The  working  of  the  same  physical  and  mechanical 
forces  lies  far  back  of  him  in  the  depths  of  the  astro- 
nomic ages.  Physical  laws,  so  far  as  all  forms  of  life 
are  concerned,  work  irrespective  of  them.  If  the 
winds  or  the  tides  bear  the  shipwrecked  mariner  to 
safety,  we  say  it  w\as  accidental;  likewise  where  the 
air-currents  will  drop  the  winged  seed  is  a  matter  of 
chance.  The  same  chance,  or  law  of  probability  in 
regard  to  living  things,  prevails  as  to  where  the 
thunderbolt  will  strike  the  earth.  It  is  more  prob- 
able that  it  will  strike  certain  kinds  of  trees  in 
the  landscape  than  certain  other  kinds;  in  a  wood 
of  mixed  hemlock,  pine,  oak,  maple,  beech,  the 
chances  seem  to  be  that  the  pines  and  the  hemlocks 
are  in  the  greatest  danger.  Physical  laws  determine 
these  things,  as  they  do  when  buildings  and  persons 
are  struck.  In  the  human  sense  Nature  does  not 
select.  In  her  garden  there  is  nothing  that  takes  the 
place  of  man  who  selects  one  of  two,  or  favors  one 
and  suppresses  the  other,  and  takes  a  short  cut  to 
specific  ends.  Nature  does  not  guard  against  waste 
or  delay.  All  time  and  all  matter  are  hers,  and  her 
losses  and  gains  are  all  one. 

The  forests  get  planted  and  trimmed,  and  a  certain 
sort  of  order  and  unity  prevails  among  them  —  the 
pines  in  one  place,  the  spruce  in  another,  the  beech, 
the  maple,  the  oak,  the  cedars  in  still  others.  Some 

235 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

species,  such  as  the  ash,  the  maple,  the  elm,  the  lin- 
den, give  their  seeds  wings,  or  devices  to  hold  grav- 
ity in  abeyance,  and  the  wind  scatters  them.  The 
cedars,  the  oaks,  and  all  the  nut-  and  fruit-bearers 
depend  upon  living  creatures  who  feed  upon  their 
fruit  to  scatter  their  seeds.  In  all  cases  the  element 
of  chance  plays  an  important  part. 

Life  is  such  a  mysterious  thing,  —  if  it  be  a  thing, 
or  an  entity,  at  all,  which  so  many  later  biologists 
dispute,  —  its  goings  and  comings  are  so  incalcu- 
lable; it  is  so  involved  in  the  material  forces,  and  yet 
seems  so  superior  to  them;  it  plays  such  a  small  part 
in  the  totality  of  the  cosmos,  and  yet  appears  to  be 
the  one  event  upon  which  all  things  wait. 

If  we  use  the  word  "chance"  as  opposed  to  "de- 
sign," or  "law"  as  opposed  to  "intelligence,"  — 
which  to  me  amounts  to  the  same  thing,  —  then,  in 
the  last  analysis  at  least,  the  conditions  of  life  were 
a  matter  of  chance. 

There  could  be  no  life  as  we  know  it  till  the  earth 
was  ripe  for  it,  till  the  waters  were  gathered  together 
with  the  air  swimming  above  them,  and  the  crust  of 
the  earth  cooled  and  became  comparatively  stable. 
And  all  these  things  were  the  result  of  the  operation 
of  irrefragable  physical  laws  —  not  of  the  order  or 
relation  of  parts  that  result  from  intelligent  design, 
but  of  the  equipoise  and  adjustment  that  come  from 
the  conflict  of  blind,  irrational  material  forces.  This 
introduces  us  to  the  world  of  chance  or  of  fate,  just 

236 


.LIFE  AND  CHxVNCE 

as  we  choose  to  regard  it  —  chance  as  being  void  of 
thought  or  purpose  and  fate  as  being  in  the  grip  of 
immutable  laws. 

The  law  of  chance  and  of  probability  is  competent 
to  account  for  all  the  particular  forms  which  bodies 
assume  in  inorganic  nature  —  a  natural  bridge,  a 
profile  in  the  rocks,  obelisks,  architectural  forms, 
brought  out  by  erosion,  etc.;  but  can  it  account 
for  the  forms  of  living  things?  The  forms  of  living 
things  are  purposeful;  the  forms  of  non-living  things 
serve  no  purpose,  there  is  no  particular  end  to  be 
served  by  them.  The  forms  of  crystals  are  not  hap- 
hazard, they  are  predetermined,  and  yet  they  serve 
no  purpose.  The  exquisite  and  mathematical  forms 
of  the  snowflakes  serve  no  purpose;  such  things  are 
the  result  of  a  particular  activity  in  matter,  and 
seem  in  some  way  to  bridge  the  gulf  between  the 
organic  and  the  inorganic.  Chemical  activity  fore- 
shadows vital  activity,  and  is  the  parent  of  it. 
Though  life  arises  out  of  chemical  reactions,  yet  a 
philosophy  of  life  expressed  in  terms  of  chemical 
reactions  is  barren  or  unsatisfactory. 

Can  the  ocean  tides  be  defined  and  accounted  for 
in  terms  of  the  mobility  of  water?  The  water  in  the 
pond  has  the  same  mobility,  but  it  has  no  tide. 
To  account  for  the  tides  we  must  look  beyond  the 
mere  fluidity  of  water,  though  without  this  fluidity 
there  would  be  no  tides.  No  more  can  life  be  de- 
fined and  accounted  for  in  terms  of  its  chemical  and 

237 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

physical  changes,  though  these  are  inseparable  from 
life. 

Behold  the  great  tidal  impulse  rolling  around  the 
world,  heaping  up  the  waters  on  this  shore  and  on 
that,  and  nullifying  its  tendency  for  the  moment  to  a 
dead  equilibrium.  In  like  manner  behold  the  organic 
impulse  flowing  through  matter  and  lifting  it  up  into 
myriads  of  novel  and  beautiful  forms  and  defeating 
its  tendency  to  settle  back  into  a  dead  equilibrium. 

I  would  not  say  in  the  case  of  life  that  there  is 
anything  analogous  to  the  lunar  and  solar  attrac- 
tions, but  would  only  suggest  that  there  is  some 
primordial  and  inexplicable  impulse  in  matter  that 
is  not  explained  by  its  chemical  and  physical  proc- 
esses. 

Chance  plays  a  greater  part  in  vegetable  life  than 
in  animal  life,  and  it  plays  a  greater  part  in  the  lower 
forms  of  life  than  in  the  higher.  The  fertilization  of 
plants  is  mostly  brought  about  through  the  agency 
of  winds  and  insects,  which  are  chance  happenings, 
contingent  upon  many  things.  The  fertilization  of 
certain  lower  forms  of  animal  life,  such  as  fishes,  is 
brought  about  by  the  agency  of  water  or  outward 
forces,  and  hence  chance  enters  largely  into  the 
problem. 

n 

It  may  help  us  to  get  nearer  the  truth  of  this 
question  of  chance  in  its  relation  to  the  origin  of  life 

238 


LIFE  AND  CHANCE 

if  we  consider  tlie  fortuitous  and  the  accidental,  not 
as  they  occur  in  a  world  of  mechanical  movements, 
but  as  they  occur  in  a  world  of  chemical  reactions. 
The  fortuitous  among  chemical  bodies  is  quite  a  dif- 
ferent thing  from  the  fortuitous  among  ponderable 
bodies.  We  might  shake  together  the  parts  of  a  watch 
for  all  eternity  and  not  get  that  adjustment  of  the 
wheels  and  springs  that  makes  a  watch.  If  a  thou- 
sand of  brick  are  dumped  upon  the  ground,  is  there 
any  probability  that  they  will  take  the  form  of  a 
house?  Or  if  the  letters  of  the  alphabet  are  shaken 
up  together  in  a  bag,  is  there  the  slightest  chance 
that  they  will  arrange  themselves  into  words  and 
that  the  words  will  arrange  themselves  into  intelli- 
gent sentences?  In  all  these  things  the  parts  have 
no  attraction  for  one  another,  but  among  chemical 
compounds,  out  of  which  living  bodies  are  built  up, 
there  rules  the  selective  force  of  chemical  affinity. 
The  elements  select  their  partners.  It  is  a  marriage 
in  which  two  literally  become  one.  Chemistry  is  on 
the  road  to  life;  chemical  transformations  lead  up 
to  the  transformations  we  call  vital.  The  physical 
forces  transport  and  transpose  and  seek  a  state  of 
rest;  they  sort  and  sift  the  sands  and  gravels  and 
clays  of  the  soil,  depositing  them  in  a  regular  series, 
but  they  never  get  beyond  the  realm  of  mere  chance. 
The  clouds  are  ever  changing,  but  they  never  change 
into  living  forms.  The  waves  shift  and  pile  the 
sands  endlessly  upon  the  shore,  but  the  shore  is 

239 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

always  essentially  the  same.  Gravity  is  the  ruling 
force.  But  among  chemical  bodies  a  new  force  ap- 
pears; chemical  affinity  is  here  the  determining  fac- 
tor. The  law  of  probability  plays  a  secondary  part. 
Spontaneous  combustion,  for  instance,  is  a  molecu- 
lar accident  only  in  a  limited  sense.  The  antecedent 
conditions  may  be  in  a  measure  accidental,  but  the 
chemical  reactions  that  bring  about  the  rise  of  tem- 
perature to  the  point  of  combustion  are  not  acci- 
dental; they  inhere  in  the  constitution  of  the  ele-^ 
ments.  Life  may  be  of  spontaneous  and  fortuitous 
origin  in  the  same  sense;  not  a  mere  chance  happen- 
ing among  unrelated  bodies,  but  the  continuation  of 
long-antecedent  conditions  brought  about  by  that 
mysterious  force  we  call  chemical  attraction.  This 
force,  as  it  were,  gives  the  elements  eyes,  and  hands, 
and  feet,  and  power  of  choice,  and  determines  the 
line  of  their  activities.  Liquid  water,  without  which 
life  could  not  exist,  was  contingent  upon  the  chemi- 
cal union  in  fixed  properties  of  the  two  gases,  oxygen 
and  hydrogen;  accident  may  have  played  a  part  in 
the  meeting  of  those  two  gases,  but,  once  met,  under 
the  proper  conditions,  water  was  bound  to  appear. 
The  chemical  union  of  oxygen  and  silica,  which 
forms  so  large  a  part  of  the  earth's  surface,  was  pre- 
determined by  the  nature  of  the  substances,  but  the 
forms  of  the  landscape  and  the  size  and  the  shape 
of  the  continents  were  not  in  the  same  sense  prede- 
termined.   An  entirely  different  disposition  of  the 

240 


LIFE  AND  CHANCE 

land  surfaces  of  the  globe  than  the  one  we  behold 
might  have  occurred. 

Life  has  its  roots  in  the  ground.  Everywhere  in 
the  inorganic  world  are  movements  that  foreshadow 
the  organic;  inanimate  nature  is  dreaming  of  the 
animate.  If  the  worm,  as  Emerson  says,  "is  striving 
to  be  man,"  the  clod  is  no  less  striving  to  be  worm. 
The  crystal  prepares  the  way  for  the  cell.  The  flow- 
ing currents  of  air  and  water  are  forerminers  of  the 
flowing  currents  of  the  living  body.  Solutions,  pre- 
cipitations, chemical  reactions,  oxidation,  osmotic 
pressure,  assimilation,  disassimilation,  catalytic 
power,  all  antedate  and  apparently  lead  up  to  the 
movement  in  matter  that  we  call  vital.  Life  had  a 
large  capital  to  begin  on.  Its  house  was  well  fur- 
nished, and  its  servants  awaited  its  call.  It  was 
dowered  with  the  air,  the  water,  the  soil,  the 
warmth,  the  light.  The  four  estates  of  matter  —  the 
solid,  the  fluid,  the  gaseous,  the  ethereal  —  were  its 
special  inheritance.  They  furnished  the  conditions. 
The  colloids  mothered  it,  the  catalyses  fathered  it. 
Electricity,  radio-activity,  chemical  transforma- 
tions, are  parts  of  its  assets.  The  forces  of  life  arc 
only  the  forces  of  inert  matter  imbued  with  a  new 
purpose.  In  the  living  body  we  see  the  same  old 
chemistry  and  physics  working  to  higher  ends.  The 
chemical  transformation  of  the  two  substances  into 
a  body  totally  unlike  either  is  a  forerunner  of  the 
magical  changes  in  the  conditions  of  matter  wrought 

2n 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

by  life.  The  scientific  philosophers  find  no  tendency 
or  activity  in  living  matter  that  they  cannot  match 
in  the  non-living;  hence  to  them  there  is  no  differ- 
ence between  the  two  that  experimental  science  can 
grasp.  But  behold  the  difference  to  our  conscious- 
ness !  The  difference  lies  in  the  purposive  activities 
of  one  that  are  absent  from  the  other.  There  is  no 
purpose  in  the  facets  of  a  crystal  in  the  sense  that 
there  is  purpose  in  the  forms  and  structures  of  living 
bodies.  The  hinge  of  a  bivalve  has  purpose  that  is 
determined  by  the  needs  of  the  organism;  but  what 
purpose  have  the  lines  of  cleavage  in  the  rocks,  or 
the  contours  of  the  hills,  or  the  courses  of  the 
streams.?  All  these  things  may  serve  man's  purpose, 
but  they  are  meaningless  when  regarded  in  their 
own  light.  There  is  no  significance  in  the  whistle  of 
the  wind  about  your  house,  but  a  whistle  of  another 
kind  there  in  the  darkness  would  startle  you.  The 
sounds  of  inanimate  nature  mean  nothing,  but  all 
sounds  that  proceed  from  living,  moving  things  are 
significant.  The  rainbow  is  an  optical  phenomenon, 
and,  though  a  beautiful  symbol  to  us  mortals,  it  is 
not  purposive;  it  plays  no  part  in  the  physics  of  the 
storm.  There  is  no  purpose  in  the  glint  of  the  dew- 
drop  nor  in  the  sparkle  of  the  diamond,  but  there  is 
purpose  in  the  fiash  of  the  firefly  and  in  the  beam  of 
the  glow-worm.  The  gay  plumage  of  certain  birds 
has  a  deep  significance  that  does  not  attach  to  the 
brilliant  hues  of  precious  stones. 

242 


LIFE  AND  CHANCE 

All  the  movements  of  nature  may  be  divided  into 
rational  and  irrational.  The  movements  of  living 
things  are  rational;  they  serve  a  purpose  in  meeting 
the  needs  of  those  things;  but  non-living  things  have 
no  needs,  hence  their  movements  are  fortuitous  and 
irrational. 

The  collisions  and  disruptions  that  take  place  in 
the  vast  depths  of  sidereal  space  show  that  chance 
takes  a  hand  in  the  game  even  there,  though  the 
universal  law  of  gravitation  is  not  annulled. 

Ill 

Though  one  has  trouble  in  reconciling  the  hit- 
and-miss  method  of  Nature  which  one  sees  all  about 
him  —  her  blind,  groping,  experimental  ways  — 
with  the  obvious  purpose  and  order  which  one  sees 
in  all  living  bodies,  yet  the  reconciliation  somehow 
exists.  Here  life  appears  and  here  it  goes  on  amid 
accidents,  delays,  waste,  failures;  at  war  with  itself, 
at  war  with  the  physical  forces;  rooted  in  the  inor- 
ganic, but  perpetually  crushed  and  destroyed  by  it ; 
the  long  evolutionary  process  crowned  by  man  as 
if  he  were  the  end  of  it  all,  yet  man  beset  by  a  thou- 
sand enemies,  internal  and  external;  his  history 
marked  by  war,  pestilence,  famine,  suffering,  injus- 
tice, the  monstrous  and  the  abnormal ;  the  methods 
and  aims  of  intelligence  seen  everywhere  in  the  or- 
ganic world,  yet  intelligence  hampered  by  matter 
and  struggling  to  be  free;  chance  taking  a  hand  in 

243 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

every  game  in  life,  and  only  life  itself  seeming  supe- 
rior to  the  clash  of  conflicting  forces. 

We  have  at  once  to  look  upon  the  organic  and  the 
inorganic  as  occupying  two  different  planes.  In  the 
world  of  inert  matter  one  sees  only  the  operation  of 
fixed  laws:  things  cannot  be  otherwise  than  as  they 
are;  fate  rules;  the  balance  of  forces  is  fatefuUy  kept. 
But  when  we  reach  the  world  of  living  things  all  this 
is  changed:  the  books  are  never  balanced;  there  is 
purpose,  flexibility,  indeterminateness,  a  shaping  of 
means  to  an  end,  an  ever-changing  fixity,  movement 
which  perpetually  defeats  the  tendency  in  matter  to 
a  dead  equilibrium.  In  life  matter  takes  on  a  new 
behavior,  enters  into  new  combinations,  builds  up 
new  forms,  and  in  a  measure  escapes  from  the  law 
of  necessity  that  rules  inanimate  bodies. 

Life  is  like  those  figures  which  the  sculptor  some- 
times carves  when  he  shows  us  the  form  of  a  youth 
or  a  maiden  partly  freed  from  the  shapeless  block  of 
marble  —  the  fiowing  and  delicate  lines  of  life  are 
quickly  lost  in  the  ragged  and  broken  lines  of  the 
insensate  stone.  Life  is  hampered  and  bound  by  the 
fatality  of  matter  in  the  same  way;  the  organic  is 
still  in  bonds  to  the  inorganic;  it  is  half  one  and  half 
the  other,  and  is  constantly  struggling  for  mere  free- 
dom. This  struggle  is  the  drama  of  evolution,  and 
the  drama  and  tragedy  of  human  history.  Its  very 
condition  is  the  union  of  two  opposing  elements  — 
fate  and  freedom  wedded  in  one  movement.    Life 

244 


LIFE  AND  CHANCE 

without  that  which  hampers  and  holds  it  would  not 
be  life;  it  would  have  no  reality,  no  expression.  The 
struggle  and  the  antagonism  give  it  body  and  power. 
It  also  opens  the  door  to  chance,  or  fortune,  as  the 
ancients  called  it. 

The  living  has  to  adapt  itself  to  the  non-living. 
The  latter  is  uncompromising;  it  goes  its  own  way  if 
all  life  perishes.  But  life  is  plastic,  inventive,  com- 
promising; it  takes  what  it  can  get;  under  the  pres- 
sure of  outward  conditions  it  is  perpetually  chang- 
ing; it  flows  on  like  a  stream,  taking  the  form  that 
external  conditions  impose  upon  it,  but  ever  flow- 
ing. It  would  not  be  life  without  this  inherent 
movement. 

All  life  asks  is  opportunity;  it  takes  its  chances  in 
the  clash  of  opposing  forces;  it  loses  at  one  point  and 
gains  at  another;  the  hazards  of  time  and  change 
modify  it,  hindering  or  helping  it,  but  do  not  ex- 
tinguish it. 

Forms  grow  old,  but  the  life-impulse  does  not  grow 
old.  The  animal  brain  suddenly  began  to  increase 
in  size  in  Tertiary  times.  Why?  To  account  for  evo- 
lution, as  I  see  it,  I  have  to  substitute  something  like 
the  creative  impulse  of  Bergson  for  the  mechanical 
and  fortuitous  selection  of  Darwin.  The  process  of 
evolution  would  have  stopped,  or  never  have  begun, 
had  there  not  been  the  inherent  tendency  of  life  to 
struggle  up  to  higher  and  more  complex  forms. 
Mechanical  forces  seek  rest ;  life  forces  seek  action 

245 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

and  change.  A  static  equilibrium  is  the  tendency  of 
the  one;  a  dynamic  disequiUbrium  is  the  aim  of  the 
other.  The  boy's  hoop  stands  up  as  long  as  he  keeps 
it  running;  it  does  not  have  time  to  fall,  gravity  is 
defeated  every  moment.  This  is  a  type  of  living 
matter;  the  life  impulse  keeps  it  from  stopping  and 
falling  down. 

It  is  easy  to  see  that  chance,  or  the  law  of  proba- 
bility, would  have  brought  the  world  of  dead  matter 
where  it  is,  but  the  living  world  presents  a  different 
problem.  Here  we  strike  the  world  of  organization, 
parts  fitted  to  parts,  and  parts  subordinated  to 
parts,  the  many  organized  into  the  one.  Still  there 
is  the  same  hit-and-miss  method  of  the  action  and 
interaction  of  bodies  upon  one  another,  the  blind 
inorganic  forces  taking  a  hand  in  the  game  of  life; 
the  seeds  are  sown  by  the  chance  action  of  the  winds 
and  the  floods,  the  forests  are  planted  and  trimmed 
by  chance;  the  chance  actions  of  squirrels  and  jays 
and  crows  plant  the  heavy  nuts,  the  grazing  cows 
plant  the  apple  and  red-thorn  seeds,  the  fruit-eating 
birds  scatter  and  drop  the  many  small  fruits;  there 
is  chance  in  the  planting  and  trimming  and  weeding 
of  Nature's  garden,  and  in  its  locality,  but  is  there 
chance  in  the  production  of  her  living  gardener,  in 
life  itself?  It  is  in  the  reciprocal  action  of  the  living 
and  the  non-living  that  life  goes  on.  Chance,  inside 
of  mechanical  and  chemical  laws,  rules  in  the  one; 
chance,  limited  and  subordinated  to  specific  ends, 

246 


LIFE  AND   CHANCE 

rules  in  the  other.  Fate  and  freedom  each  play  a 
part  in  life.  The  plants  that  spread  by  runners  are 
free  to  spread  in  all  directions,  but  they  are  fated 
to  run ;  the  vines  that  climb  by  tendrils  are  free  to 
reach  out  in  all  directions,  and  their  tendrils  react 
to  whatever  they  touch,  and  cling  there;  the  fate  of 
their  organization  limits  them  to  this  mode  of  get- 
ting up  in  the  sun  and  air.  Were  there  not  some- 
thing fixed  and  upright,  the  tendriled  vines  and 
plants  could  not  get  on  in  the  world.  Every  tree  and 
every  plant  has  its  typical  form,  but  what  variations 
inside  that  pattern  or  form !  The  pines  and  spruces 
must  throw  out  their  branches  in  whorls  at  regular 
intervals,  with  one  central  shoot  leading  the  ranks 
upward;  this  is  the  fixed  or  stereotyped  form,  but 
kill  the  central  shoot,  and  the  tree  is  free  to  pro- 
mote one  of  the  lateral  shoots  to  take  the  place  of 
the  lost  leader.  The  maple-leaves,  the  oak-leaves, 
are  of  fixed  patterns,  but  how  hard  to  find  two  leaves 
of  the  same  tree  that  are  exactly  alike !  The  mating 
of  the  queen  bee  and  the  drones  in  the  air  of  a  sum- 
mer's day  is  a  chance  meeting;  the  mating  of  men 
and  women  from  which  marriages  result  is  largely  a 
chance  meeting;  the  fertilization  of  flowers  through 
the  agency  of  insects  is  largely  a  chance  occurrence; 
if  the  weather  is  bad  for  a  number  of  consecutive 
days,  the  fertilization  does  not  take  place.  Chance 
enters  into  life  in  this  way.  As  the  inorganic  forces 
are  blind  and  haphazard,  and  the  wind  bloweth 

247 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

where  it  listeth,  the  success  of  the  organic  forces,  so 
far  as  they  draw  upon  these  things,  is  fortuitous  also. 
Aristotle  seems  to  think  that  organisms  are  under 
the  same  rule  of  necessity  as  prevails  in  the  inor- 
ganic world.  The  rain,  he  says,  does  not  fall  in  order 
to  make  the  corn  grow  any  more  than  it  falls  to  spoil 
the  corn  when  it  is  threshed  out  in  the  field.  This  is 
the  modern  scientific  view.  The  weather-system  is 
indifferent  to  crops;  the  rain  falls  by  reason  of  the 
laws  of  physics,  which  always  acts  the  same  under 
the  same  conditions.  The  rain  is  not  designed  for 
the  corn,  but  the  corn  avails  itself  of  the  rain  be- 
cause it  has  organic  needs.  The  rain  has  no  needs; 
inert  matter  has  no  needs;  it  is  ruled  by  necessity, 
but  living  things  are  ruled  by  a  different  order  of 
necessity  —  the  necessity  arising  from  their  internal 
spontaneity,  of  which  Aristotle  speaks.  Aristotle 
thinks  that  the  teeth  and  other  organs  of  an  animal 
have  a  merely  accidental  relation  to  its  body,  and  to 
all  the  parts  to  which  we  attribute  design;  they  con- 
tinue, and  are  perfected  because  they  are  useful. 
This  is  natural  selection  before  Darwin.  But  it  is 
more  in  agreement  with  the  thought  of  to-day  to 
regard  all  the  parts  of  a  living  body  as  the  result  of 
an  inherent  demand  of  the  organism  —  the  "inter- 
nal spontaneity"  which  Aristotle  had  in  mind.  All 
parts  of  living  bodies  are  appropriately  constituted, 
but  the  word  "appropriate"  does  not  apply  in  the 
same  sense  to  winds  and  clouds. 

248 


LIFE  AND  CHANCE 

IV 

Contingency  attends  all  forms  of  life,  but  deter- 
minism rules  throughout  the  realm  of  insensate 
matter.  The  pulp  of  all  fruits  is  purposeful;  it  is  a 
wage  for  any  animal  that  will  come  and  sow  this 
seed,  but  behold  how  largely  chance  enters  into  this 
bargain!  The  heavy  nuts  have  neither  hooks  nor 
springs  nor  wings,  but  they  are  toothsome  to  birds 
and  beasts  which  supply  feet  and  wings,  hence  they 
get  scattered.  Every  part  and  organ  of  a  living  body 
is  purposeful,  and  not  the  result  of  chance  as  we  use 
the  term,  but  its  lot  is  cast  in  a  world  of  unorganized 
material  forces,  which  go  their  endless  rounds  from 
one  static  condition  to  another,  bound  in  the  iron 
law  of  causality. 

Nature  makes  her  knives  and  shears  and  drills 
and  chisels  and  augers  and  hammers  a  part  of  a 
living  organism,  while  with  man  they  are  but  the 
mechanical  extension  of  his  hand  and  brain.  The 
parts  of  a  watch  are  no  more  purposeful  than  are  the 
parts  of  the  human  body,  and  are  no  more  the  result 
of  a  "fortuitous  concourse  of  atoms";  but  there  is 
no  mystery  about  a  watch;  it  can  all  be  explained  in 
terms  of  mechanics  plus  the  mind  of  man.  A  living 
body  cannot  be  so  explained;  the  mystery  is  in  the 
organizing  principle  which  defies  all  analysis  and  all 
attempts  at  reproduction.  "Natural  philosophy," 
says  Professor  Soddy,  of  Glasgow  University,  "may 

249 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

explain  a  rainbow,  but  not  a  rabbit."  We  can  pro- 
duce a  rainbow  at  will,  but  only  rabbits  can  produce 
rabbits.  Yet  Professor  Soddy  seems  to  think  it  is 
not  improbable  that  the  time  will  come  when  the 
chemist  will  be  "able  to  synthesize  foodstuffs  apart 
from  the  life-process."  If  he  means  directly  from 
the  inorganic  elements,  I  do  not  see  why  it  would 
not  be  as  easy  to  synthesize  a  rabbit  as  to  synthesize 
a  peach,  or  a  kernel  of  wheat,  or  a  beefsteak,  or  an 
egg,  "apart  from  the  life -process." 
/  Fate  and  freedom  play  with  or  against  each  other 
in  all  living  things ;  there  is  fate  in  the  material  con- 
ditions of  life,  and  freedom  in  life  itself;  their  inter- 
action opens  the  door  to  chance;  freedom  of  choice 
in  us  makes  all  our  mistakes  and  failures  possible. 
Life  is  plastic,  fluid,  a  flowing  metamorphosis,  ever 
and  never  the  same. 

When  the  wind  snatched  my  hat  off  my  head  the 
other  day,  and  carried  it  down  the  street  amid  a 
cloud  of  dust  and  dry  leaves,  whisking  it  across  to 
the  other  side  and  between  the  feet  of  a  colored  man 
bearing  a  big  bundle  of  excelsior  on  his  shoulders, 
the  hat  was  completely  in  the  grip  of  the  fateful 
material  forces.  But  the  colored  man  who  seized  it 
and  held  it  was  force  of  another  kind.  The  wind 
might  have  carried  him  away  also  had  it  been 
stronger,  but  he  would  at  least  have  struggled  and 
opposed  his  strength  to  it.  And  it  is  in  this  that  the 
freedom  of  life  consists  —  freedom  to  struggle,  to 

250 


LIFE  AND  CHANCE 

push  on,  to  overcome  obstacles,  and  to  turn  the  in- 
organic forces  against  themselves,  thus  making  life 
strong  by  the  strength  of  the  obstacle  it  surmounts. 
We  cannot  still  the  wind,  but  in  our  sailboats  we 
can  use  it. 

The  extent  to  which  the  law  of  probability  rules 
in  the  organic  world  is  seen  in  the  fact  that  the  pro- 
portion of  males  to  females  among  all  species  keeps 
pretty  uniform.  In  any  given  city  or  country  there 
will  probably  be  about  the  same  number  of  deaths 
from  the  various  diseases  year  after  year,  unless 
some  means  of  fighting  disease  are  employed.  There 
will  be  about  the  same  number  of  weddings  and 
elopements,  about  the  same  number  of  defective 
persons  born,  about  the  same  number  of  persons 
that  reach  extreme  old  age,  and  of  persons  above  or 
under  the  average  height.  The  fluctuations  about  a 
common  mean  in  all  things  will  be  pretty  regular. 
Indeed,  the  law  of  averages  plays  about  as  full  a 
part  in  organic  as  in  inorganic  nature.  It  is  prob- 
able that  just  about  as  many  boys  will  be  drowned 
while  skating  each  winter  and  while  bathing  each 
summer. 

In  a  world  of  pure  mechanics  and  chemistry  all 
these  things  would  remain  about  the  same,  century 
after  century.  But  the  reason  and  soul  of  man  intro- 
duce a  new  element,  and  the  dice  are  loaded,  at 
times,  at  least.  Still,  the  law  of  probability  plays  a 
prominent  part  in  the  affairs  of  men  and  nations. 

251 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

Over  and  above  our  wills  and  purposes  stream  the 
great  cosmic  currents  which  we  cannot  stem,  but 
which,  in  a  measure,  we  can  and  do  utilize. 

Development  is  what  distinguishes  the  living 
from  the  dead.  Friction  and  collision,  warmth  and 
moisture,  do  not  develop  the  pebbles  on  the  beach. 

A  variation  proves  advantageous  only  to  some- 
thing growing,  expanding,  and  seeking  advantages 
and  capable  of  profiting  by  them.  The  tendency  of 
the  action  of  outward  physical  forces  upon  a  body 
is  to  produce  uniformity,  and  if  living  bodies  were 
shaped  by  these  forces  alone  they  would  all  be  alike. 
If  there  was  not  something  in  every  living  form  that 
was  sui  generis,  they  would  all  be  alike. 

The  slight  variations  in  the  forms  of  living  things 
are  doubtless  the  result  of  outward  chance  occur- 
rences. In  passing  from  the  purely  mechanical  to 
the  vital,  we  seem  to  enter  a  realm  where  the  dice 
are  loaded,  chance  still  plays  a  part,  but  a  secondary 
part.  The  perfect  apple  on  the  tree  has  escaped 
many  mishaps  of  wind  and  storm  and  hostile  insect 
and  germ,  but  it  is  not  a  matter  of  chance  that  it  is 
an  apple,  and  that  it  is  sweet  or  sour,  red  or  green, 
round  or  flat.  That  variety  of  apple  is  always  thus 
with  possible  modifications.  Soil,  climate,  exposure, 
culture,  all  have  their  influence. 

In  all  marriages  and  social  relations  chance  plays 
a  part  —  a  chance  meeting,  an  auspicious  moment; 
but  sex  and  the  social  instinct  are  not  a  matter  of 

252 


LIFE  AND  CHANCE 

chance.   There  is  no  chance  in  the  workings  of  the 
Mendelian  law;  it  is  mathematically  exact. 

If  a  hybrid  which  results  from  the  crossing  of  two 
varieties  that  differ  from  each  other  only  in  one  spe- 
cific character,  as  in  color,  or  tallness,  or  shortness, 
be  planted,  we  know  that  one  fom*th  of  the  seeds 
will  take  on  the  character  of  one  grandparent,  and 
one  fom^th  take  on  the  character  of  the  other,  and 
that  the  other  two  fom-ths  of  them  will  take  on  the 
character  of  the  hybrid,  and  that  this  order  will 
repeat  itself  endlessly.  Chance  takes  no  part  in  the 
result.  The  dominant  characters  are  constantly 
separated  from  each  other  in  the  second  generation 
to  the  extent  of  one  half,  while  the  other  half  re- 
mains hybrid. 

The  element  of  chance  enters  into  all  the  opera- 
tions of  outward  nature.  Not  a  flower  blooms,  not 
a  fruit  forms,  not  a  drop  of  rain  falls,  not  a  child 
is  born,  but  is  more  or  less  contingent  upon  the 
changes  and  fluctuations  of  the  natural  currents  and 
forces.  But  the  capacity  of  matter  itself  to  produce 
life  we  cannot  think  of  as  accidental ;  only  its  devel- 
opment is  subject  to  the  law  of  chance  in  a  world 
of  conflicting  forces. 

If  the  seed  did  not  possess  an  innate  tendency 
to  grow  and  unfold  under  favoring  conditions,  the 
flower,  the  fruit,  could  not  appear,  nor  the  child  be 
born.  And  if  matter  did  not  possess  potential  life, 
life  could  never  have  appeared  in  the  world. 

253 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

I  conceive  that  the  appearance  of  life  upon  this 
globe  was  a  matter  of  chance  in  the  same  way  that 
fertilization  or  impregnation  in  the  vegetable  and 
animal  world  is  a  matter  of  chance.  There  is  the 
possibility  of  fertilization  to  start  with,  and  there  is 
the  inherent  tendency,  but  unless  conditions  favor, 

—  conditions  that  are  contingent  upon  many  things, 

—  it  does  not  take  place.  In  the  vegetable  world, 
storms,  frosts,  rains,  floods  may  prevent  fertiliza- 
tion; or  the  part  played  by  insects  may  be  nega- 
tived in  some  way.  In  the  animal  world,  external 
conditions,  as  well  as  internal,  must  also  favor,  and 
fortune  certainly  plays  a  part  in  the  game.  In  cold, 
late  springs  the  first  birds'  nests  contain  fewer  eggs 
than  the  nests  do  in  warm,  early  seasons.  One  sum- 
mer there  is  an  invasion  of  insect  pests  —  grasshop- 
pers, or  tent-caterpillars,  or  forest-worms ;  the  chance 
conditions  favored  them.  The  next  season  the  coun- 
try may  be  quite  free  from  them,  the  conditions 
having  been  reversed.  The  slow  or  the  rapid  in- 
crease of  the  population  of  a  country  is  contingent 
upon  many  things.  Economic  conditions  play  a 
part,  climate  plays  a  part,  the  geography  and  the 
geology  play  a  part.  What  a  part  the  Gulf  Stream 
has  played  in  the  life  of  the  British  Islands!  What  a 
part  a  great  river,  an  inland  sea,  or  a  much  broken 
coastline  plays  in  the  life  of  the  countries  to  which 
these  belong!  Life  is  expansive,  tends  to  push  out 
and  develop,  but  it  is  at  the  mercy  of  external  con- 

254 


LIFE  AND  CHANCE 

ditlons.   Environment  is  either  a  check  or  a  stimu- 
lant. 

The  origin  of  hfe  and  the  many  forms  it  has  taken 
were  probably  a  matter  of  chance  in  the  same  sense 
that  the  origin  of  springs  and  streams  and  the  for- 
mation of  rivers  were  matters  of  chance.  Given  our 
weather-system,  and  the  unequal  elevation  of  land 
above  the  sea,  and  fountains  and  streams  are  bound 
to  appear,  but  they  will  all  be  modified  and  shaped 
by  the  chance  conditions  they  encounter.  Water 
will  flow,  and  the  tendency  of  life  to  push  out  and 
on,  and  organize  itself  into  new  forms,  is  equally 
inherent.  It  seems  to  me  we  have  to  take  into  ac- 
count this  innate  expansive  or  evolutionary  force  in 
living  matter.  To  ask  whence  it  comes,  how  it  is 
related  to  the  matter  which  it  animates,  as  mankind 
so  long  have  asked,  is  at  once  to  get  beyond  sound- 
ing. All  forms  of  life  bear  the  stamp  of  the  environ- 
ment. Life  must  adapt  itself  to  its  material  con- 
ditions. And  this  living  adaptation  of  life  to  its 
environment  is  radically  different  from  a  mechanical 
adjustment.  Inanimate  bodies  adjust  themselves, 
animate  bodies  adapt  themselves.  It  is  this  power 
of  adaptation  which  makes  all  purely  mechanistic 
conceptions  of  life  so  inadequate.  The  only  machine 
that  can  fit  itself  to  the  medium  in  which  it  moves  is 
the  living  machine.  To  inquire  into  the  fitness  of 
the  environment  is  to  reverse  the  problem,  and  leads 
to  confusion;  since  the  environment  is  uncompro- 

255 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

mising,  and  life  must  adapt  itself  to  it  or  cease  to 
be.  Man  can  and  does  alter  his  environment  to  a 
limited  extent,  but  not  so  radically  as  his  environ- 
ment alters  him.  He  cannot  change  the  air  he 
breathes,  or  the  water  he  drinks,  or  the  nature  of  the 
food  he  eats,  nor  change  his  vital  relations  to  the 
physical  world.  His  mechanical  relations,  to  a  cer- 
tain extent,  wait  upon  his  will,  but  his  vital  rela- 
tions are  forever  fixed.  The  place  and  the  hour 
leave  their  mark  upon  everything  —  more  upon  the 
plastic  and  adaptive  forms  of  life  than  upon  the 
rigid  and  immobile  forms  of  death.  If  you  and  I  had 
been  born  in  another  month,  another  season,  or  in 
another  country  than  we  were,  can  there  be  any 
doubt  that  we  should  have  been  quite  other  than 
we  are?  If  Carlyle  had  come  and  settled  here  when 
Emerson  invited  him,  is  it  not  almost  certain  that 
his  outlook  upon  life  would  have  been  radically 
changed,  and  his  literary  output  different?  The 
currents  flow;  life  moulds  itself  to  the  moments  as 
they  fly.  The  almost  infinite  diversities  of  types  and 
characters  attest  the  influence  of  the  chance  hap- 
penings in  the  environment.  The  plains  beget  one 
type  of  life;  the  mountains,  the  desert,  the  sea,  the 
wilderness  beget  others.  The  professions  and  occu- 
pations beget  their  types.  The  general  type  of  a 
race  long  adjusted  to  its  environment  —  the  Eng- 
lish, the  French,  the  Arabian,  the  Mongolian  — 
remains  fairly  constant,  but  inside  this  constancy 

256 


LIFE  AND  CHANCE 

occur  the  slight  local  differences  owing  to  differences 
in  environment.  No  doubt  extraordinary  men  are 
in  a  measure  the  result  of  happy  accident.  There 
are  determining  or  favoring  factors  —  race,  climate, 
family  inheritance,  and  so  on  —  and  there  are  modi- 
fying and  fortuitous  factors  in  the  daily  lives  and 
habits  of  the  parents  and  in  the  social  conditions. 
The  web  of  human  life  is  so  complex,  so  many  influ- 
ences and  inheritances  converge  and  unite  in  the 
genesis  of  every  life,  that  the  elements  of  chance 
or  fortune  inevitably  play  a  part.  The  malformed, 
the  underwitted,  the  monstrosities,  the  still-born, 
all  afford  evidence  of  how  the  plans  of  Nature  are 
thwarted  or  marred  by  accident.  This  factor  of 
chance  invades  even  the  life  of  the  cells,  and  occa- 
sionally some  part  is  absent  or  defective. 


The  forms  and  distributions  of  bodies  in  inorganic 
nature  are  not  important;  any  other  scheme  or  re- 
arrangement would  do  just  as  well.  The  wonderful 
monumental  and  architectural  rock-forms  in  the 
great  Southwest  are  purely  a  matter  of  chance  — 
that  is,  they  serve  no  special  purpose,  though,  given 
the  kind  of  rock,  and  the  conditions,  they  are  inevi- 
table; they  are  fated  to  be  thus  and  not  otherwise. 
But  the  men  and  women  who  make  long  journeys  to 
view  the  marvelous  spectacle  are  not  in  the  same 
way  a  matter  of  chance,  and  their  going  thither  is 

257 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

not  a  matter  of  chance;  other  than  physical  causes 
have  determined  the  journey.  Their  desire  to  make 
the  journey  has  its  physical  basis,  but  the  journey 
itself  was  not  inevitable  like  the  flow  of  water  down- 
hill, or  like  the  geometric  forms  of  the  rocks  them- 
selves.  A  psychic  principle  played  a  part. 

Man's  freedom  is  not  that  of  the  wind  which 
bloweth  where  it  listeth,  but  freedom  to  go  against 
the  wind,  or  to  conquer  and  use  the  forces  that 
oppose  him.  There  is  no  movement  in  inanimate 
nature  that  typifies  human  freedom;  only  living 
beings  withstand  and  turn  to  their  own  account  the 
forces  of  dead  matter. 

Man's  work  is  geometric;  he  runs  to  angles  and 
right  lines;  in  other  words,  to  parts  and  fragments. 
The  circuitous  method  of  Nature  —  her  waste,  her 
delays,  her  confusion,  her  endless  seeking,  her  sur- 
vival of  the  fittest,  her  all-around-the-horizon  activ- 
ities —  he  seeks  to  avoid,  because  he  is  not  con- 
cerned with  the  All,  but  with  a  part.  He  aims  at 
victories  now  and  here,  and  not  in  the  next  geologic 
age.  He  would  eliminate  the  element  of  chance.  He 
does  not  wait  for  the  winds  and  the  floods  to  sow  his 
seeds  or  plant  his  trees,  or  for  the  storms  to  trim  and 
thin  his  forests;  he  takes  short  cuts,  he  saves  time 
because  he  has  not  all  time;  he  selects  and  abridges 
and  cuts  out,  and  reaches  his  ends  by  direct,  geo- 
metric methods. 

The    red-thorn    in    the    pasture    is    constantly 

258 


LIFE  AND   CHANCE 

cropped  back  by  the  cattle;  the  first  shoot  is 
browsed  off  half  its  length  or  more,  but  the  push 
of  life  is  behind  it,  and  it  throws  out  one  or  more 
lateral  shoots;  the  ends  of  these  are  nipped,  and  the 
shoots  that  remain  again  subdivide,  thus  causing 
the  would-be  tree  to  spread  out  wider  and  wider 
upon  the  ground.  The  cropping  continues,  every 
new  shoot  is  nipped,  and  the  bush  rises  slowly  as  its 
circle  extends  farther  and  farther.  Its  progress  is 
slow.  Every  season  it  goes  through  the  same  ordeal; 
every  nip  from  the  cows  is  met  by  new  subdivisions 
of  the  shoots,  till  the  rising  bush  becomes  an  impen- 
etrable network  of  short,  thorny  branches.  The 
mass  is  so  dense  that  only  the  small  birds  can  enter 
it.  I  have  seen  a  song  sparrow  take  refuge  in  it  when 
hotly  pursued  by  a  hawk.  The  hawk  flies  round  and 
round,  unable  to  reach  his  \'ictim.  As  inevitably  as 
fate,  the  mass  rises  in  the  form  of  a  cone,  pushing  its 
enemy  farther  and  farther  away  till  it  is  four  or  five 
feet  high  and  as  many  feet  broad  at  the  base.  Its 
triumph  is  now  near  at  hand.  Its  top  reaches  a  point 
where  the  cattle  do  not  easily  reach;  they  neglect 
the  central  twig  at  the  apex  of  the  cone;  this  shoots 
up,  and  having  the  whole  push  of  the  extensive  root 
system  of  the  tree  behind  it,  grows  rapidly  as  if  in 
a  race  for  life.  I  see  such  a  red-thorn  daily  in  my 
walks.  Last  year  it  won  with  this  central  shoot;  this 
year  it  has  made  rapid  progress,  and  now  it  has  a 
stalk  two  feet  high  which  the  cattle  cannot  again 

259 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

crop.  They  will  continue  to  crop  the  cone  beneath  it 
as  long  as  fresh  shoots  are  put  out,  but  as  the  life 
of  the  tree  is  more  and  more  drawn  off  from  this 
mound  at  the  base,  and  transferred  to  the  rising  top, 
the  base  will  soon  cease  to  grow  and  will  slowly  die. 
So  that  in  a  few  years  more  the  tree  will  assume  the 
shape  of  an  hourglass,  the  upper  half  flourishing, 
the  lower  haK  at  a  standstill  or  slowly  going  back. 
And  in  a  few  years  more  the  hourglass  form  will  have 
faded;  only  a  part  of  the  lower  half  will  remain,  and 
so  the  tree,  after  a  struggle  of  many  years,  \a\\  come 
into  shape  and  drop  its  fruit  to  the  cattle  that  were 
so  bent  on  destroying  it,  and  who,  by  eating  this 
fruit,  will  plant  more  thorn-trees  all  over  the  land- 
scape.   Not  all  species  of  trees  possess  this  power  of 
strugghng  successfully  against  their  enemies.   The 
linden,  for  instance,  when  cropped  by  the  cattle,  re- 
sorts to  no  such  tactics  as  do  the  apple  and  the  red- 
thorn.   In  its  simplicity  it  pushes  out  new  shoots 
each  year  to  be  cropped  off  by  the  cattle,  and  it 
never  gets  above  their  reach.  The  push  of  life  is 
there,  but  it  is  along  right  lines.  There  is  no  ma- 
noeuvring for  advantage,  as  with  the  thorn. 

The  red-thorn  in  the  pasture,  struggling  to  be- 
come a  tree,  is  a  good  type  of  life.  Accident  and 
destiny  enter  into  its  problem  in  due  proportion. 
Accidents  are  analogous  to  the  grazing  cattle,  and 
destiny  to  the  inherent  nature  of  the  tree.  All  life 
is  certainly  more  or  less  a  struggle  against  opposing 

260 


I 


LIFE   AND   CHANCE 

forces,  and  were  it  not  for  the  push  of  Hfe  within, 
Hving  bodies  would  soon  cease  to  be  such;  and  if 
the  part  played  by  changing  fortunes  without  were 
greater  or  less  than  it  is,  these  bodies  might  present 
a  far  different  appearance  from  that  which  we  now 
behold. 


XIV 

LIFE  THE  TRAVELER 

I 

WHEN  I  was  a  boy  and  studied  astronomy 
at  school  I  thought  of  Kepler's  radius  vector 
as  a  real  thing  that  played  an  important  part  in 
celestial  mechanics.  Later,  in  following  Darwin's 
theory  of  animal  evolution,  I  found  the  same  tend- 
ency in  myseK  and  in  others  to  objectify  natural 
selection  and  regard  it  as  a  positive  agent  or  prin- 
ciple that  controlled  and  determined  the  origin  of 
species. 

Darwinians  are  prone  to  imply  that  Nature  se- 
lects as  man  selects,  by  positive  interference.  Even 
so  great  a  natural  philosopher  as  Weismann  speaks 
of  natural  selection  as  a  positive  force.  He  says  in  so 
many  words  that  it  "is  the  cause  of  a  great  part  of 
the  physical  evolution  of  organisms  on  the  earth  — 
the  guiding  factor  of  evolution  which  creates  what 
is  new  out  of  the  transmissible  variations,  by  order- 
ing and  arranging  them,  selecting  them  in  relation 
to  their  number  and  size,  as  the  architect  does  his 
building  stone ^  so  that  a  particular  style  may  result^* i 
(The  italics  are  mine.)  Natural  selection,  then,  ac- 
cording to  this  ultra-Darwinian,  is  something  that 

262 


LIFE  THE  TRAVELER 

knows  what  it  wants  from  the  first,  as  the  architect 
does  when  he  begins  his  building,  or  as  the  breeder 
does,  say,  when  he  sets  out  to  produce  a  pouter  or 
a  tumbler  pigeon. 

In  his  work  on  "Heredity,"  Weismann  proceeds 
further  to  illustrate  his  conception  of  the  positive 
character  of  natural  selection  in  originating  new 
species,  by  comparing  it  to  a  traveler  on  a  journey. 
His  traveler  proceeds  from  a  certain  point  on  foot  by 
short  stages  at  any  given  time  and  in  any  direction 
—  the  direction  being  determined  by  the  lay  of  the 
land,  and  by  its  features  of  mountain,  wood,  and 
stream,  and  other  obstacles.  He  will  take  the  line  of 
least  resistance.  But  if  he  is  a  real  traveler,  and  not 
a  vagrant,  an  aimless  wanderer  in  the  wilderness, 
will  he  not  be  going  somewhere,  aiming  at  some  pre- 
determined goal?  Some  purpose,  and  not  the  lay  of 
the  land,  set  him  traveling;  he  will  keep,  in  a  general 
way,  a  given  direction.  His  course  will  be  modified 
more  or  less  by  the  obstacles  he  encounters,  but 
these  obstacles  will  not  keep  him  going,  nor  deter- 
mine his  goal. 

Will  the  organizing  impulse,  set  aimlessly  wander- 
ing in  the  wilderness  of  inert  matter,  and  taking  only 
the  line  of  least  resistance,  finally  attain  to  all  the 
beautiful  and  wonderful  living  forms  that  people 
the  earth?  Will  it  evolve  the  fish,  the  bird,  the 
mammal,  and  finally  man?  Do  we  find  anything 
in  the  constitution  of  the  primary  elements  that 

263 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

foreshadows  these  things?  Or  in  organized  matter 
itself?  Could  we  infer  the  bird  from  the  reptile?  or 
man  from  the  unreasoning  brute? 

Even  if  we  accept  Weismann's  conception  of 
natural  selection  as  like  unto  a  man  on  a  journey  in 
a  pathless  wilderness,  do  we  not  still  want  some  ex- 
planation of  why  he  has  undertaken  the  journey  and 
what  his  ultimate  goal  may  be?  A  man  lost  in  the 
woods  or  in  the  desert  wanders  blindly  on  in  a  circle 
and  gets  nowhere.  Could  evolution  ever  have  ar- 
rived at  man,  had  not  man,  in  some  way  beyond  our 
power  to  grasp,  been  potential  in  the  primal  organ- 
izing impulse?  And  so  of  all  other  forms?  But 
Weismann's  traveler  does  not  know  where  he  is  go- 
ing; he  goes  where  "the  most  tortuous  and  winding 
route  leads  him."  There  is  no  intelligence  in  the 
matter,  there  is  only  blind  groping.  Then  Weis- 
mann's traveler  starts  on  his  journey  as  one  of  the 
very  low  forms  of  life,  and  by  sheer  luck,  and  by 
blindly  running  the  gantlet  of  all  the  countless 
hazards  of  the  long  geologic  ages,  he  ends  as  man. 
Other  forms  on  the  same  journey,  through  the  law 
of  probability,  end  as  reptiles,  or  birds,  or  butter- 
flies, or  quadrupeds.  It  is  all  a  chance  throw  of  the 
dice.  A  stream  of  water  starting  on  the  mountain- 
side takes  the  easiest  way  and  reaches  the  river  or 
the  lake  or  the  sea.  It  is  all  a  matter  of  physics. 
Whether  it  flow  north  or  south  or  east  or  west  de- 
pends upon  the  lay  of  the  land.  All  its  loopings  and 

264 


LIFE  THE  TRAVELER 

doublings  are,  in  a  measure,  accidental.  But  it  ends 
as  it  began,  a  stream  of  water  and  only  that.  But 
the  stream  of  life  begins  in  definite  forms,  and,  as  it 
flows  on,  changes  perpetually  and  increasingly  into 
higher  and  more  complex  forms.  Its  physics  and 
chemistry  are  the  same  as  that  of  the  stream  of  non- 
living bodies,  its  elements  are  the  same,  but  changes 
and  transformations  take  place  of  which  non-living 
forms  know  nothing.  Of  course  the  fortuitous  plays 
a  part  in  the  course  of  the  living  as  in  that  of  the 
non-living,  but  it  plays  an  entirely  secondary  part. 
The  seeds  that  fall  upon  rocky  or  barren  places  do 
not  sprout,  and  they  fall  where  the  chance  winds  or 
floods  drop  them. 

We  may  never  be  able  to  make  a  logical  statement 
about  this  something  here  hinted  at,  but  that  there 
is  no  controlling  purpose  in  organic  nature,  that  the 
eye,  the  heart,  the  brain  of  man,  are  mere  molecular 
accidents,  like  a  profile  in  the  rocks,  or  a  face  in  the 
clouds,  is  unthinkable.  Natural  selection  does  not 
work  on  dead  things,  and  it  does  not  beget  life,  and 
in  the  origin  of  species  it  can  play  only  a  secondary 
part.  As  has  been  said,  it  may,  in  a  measm-e,  ac- 
count for  the  survival  of  the  fittest,  but  not  for  the 
arrival  of  the  fittest. 

Natural  selection  is  only  a  name  for  a  weeding-out 
or  eliminating  process,  and  were  it  not  for  the  inher- 
ent tendency  to  development  which  organisms  pos- 
sess, coupled  with  the  variations  tliat  result  from 

265 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

environmental  influences,  natural  selection  would 
have  nothing  to  go  upon.  It  is  the  conflict  between 
the  push  of  life  and  the  obstacles  which  it  encounters 
that  results  in  the  survival  of  the  fittest.  The  prime 
factor  in  the  origin  of  species  is  this  aboriginal  push 
or  organizing  tendency,  the  modifying  factor  is  the 
stress  of  the  environment.  Are  we  not  compelled 
to  look  upon  organic  nature  as  a  whole,  and  to  say 
that  it  knows  from  the  first  what  it  wants,  and  the 
means  to  obtain  it?  Could  any  struggle  for  life  of 
the  lower  organisms  have  resulted  in  the  higher 
forms  had  not  these  forms  been  in  some  way  predi- 
cated in  the  lower?  The  German  biologist  and  phi- 
losopher makes  this  struggle  creative.  It  does  not 
merely  bring  out  inherent  capabilities,  it  begets 
those  capabilities  de  novo.  Natural  selection  is  all- 
potent.  "No  leaves  or  flowers,"  he  says,  "no  diges- 
tion or  system,  no  lungs,  legs,  wings,  bones,  or 
muscles  were  present  in  the  primitive  forms,  and  all 
these  must  have  arisen  from  them  according  to  the 
principle  of  natural  selection."  Natural  selection 
invented  and  perfected  the  wonderful  piece  of  mech- 
anism we  know  as  the  human  body.  The  kidneys, 
the  liver,  the  lungs,  the  heart,  the  brain,  the  eye,  the 
hand,  the  double  circulation,  —  all  the  result  of 
chance,  or  the  hit-and-miss  method  of  the  blind, 
irrational  physical  and  chemical  forces! 

Why  these  forces  left  some  forms  so  low  down  in 
the  animal  scale,  and  carried  others  so  much  higher 

^66 


LIFE  THE  TRAVELER 

up,  does  not  appear.  Natural  selection  has  shown 
great  partiality.  Weismann  admits  that  "these 
primitive  forms  were  in  a  certain  sense  predestined 
to  development."  The  traveler  was  predestined  to 
get  out  of  the  woods  and  reach  his  goal,  but  only  in 
case  he  had  a  goal,  and  knew  in  what  direction  it  lay. 

Does  not  the  plasticity  of  living  forms,  their  power 
of  adaptation,  their  capacity  to  profit  by  fortuitous 
circumstances,  imply  something  super-mechanical 
and  super-chemical  that  natural  selection  could 
neither  give  nor  take  away? 

Behold  an  army  on  a  forced  march;  see  the  weak 
and  incompetent  fall  out  and  drop  by  the  wayside. 
That  is  natural  selection,  the  survival  of  the  fittest; 
only  the  strongest  and  the  least  handicapped  reach 
the  goal.  The  only  positive  things  are  the  plans 
of  the  commanding  general  and  the  impulse  that 
sends  the  troops  forward.  Darwin  himself  never 
looked  upon  natural  selection  as  a  cause,  or  in  any 
sense  a  directing  agent,  but  as  a  name  for  a  process 
—  a  sifting  process  that  led  to  the  survival  of  the 
most  fit.  Darwinism  makes  no  account  of  the  evo- 
lutionary impulse  —  the  constant  push  of  life  that 
lies  back  of,  and  makes  possible,  this  drama  of 
creation.  Development  implies  an  inward  tend- 
ency to  development,  something  that  profits  by 
development.  The  myriad  of  living  forms  could 
only  arrive  under  the  pressure  of  an  organizing  tend- 
ency in  living  matter.    Natural  selection  may  trim 

267 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

the  tree,  but  it  does  not  plant  it,  nor  make  it  grow, 
nor  prescribe  one  form  to  the  pine  and  another  to 
the  oak.  Do  we  not  have  to  think  of  all  these 
things  as  involved  in  the  mystery  of  the  evolution- 
ary impulse  itself?  What  that  impulse  is,  in  the 
terms  of  the  rest  of  our  knowledge,  or  whence  it 
comes,  or  how  it  adheres  to  matter,  is  one  of  the 
fundamental  mysteries. 

Biologists  who  hold  to  the  mechanistic  concep- 
tion of  life,  or  to  its  explanation  in  terms  of  chem- 
istry and  physics,  lose  their  reckoning  when  con- 
fronted by  the  strange  power  of  regeneration  which 
certain  low  forms  of  animals  possess,  and  which 
the  higher  forms  do  not  possess.  The  body  of  the 
newt  has  power  to  grow  a  new  eye  to  take  the  place 
of  a  lost  one,'  and  to  reproduce  it  by  a  new  process, 
radically  different  from  the  process  that  gave  it 
the  first  eye.  This,  and  other  like  phenomena,  to 
my  mind  can  be  interpreted  only  in  terms  of  intelli- 
gence. Such  a  procedure  transcends  all  we  know 
of  chemistry  and  physics.  Something  in  the  body 
knows  what  it  wants,  and  knows  how  to  proceed 
to  obtain  it.  The  impulse  or  organizing  tendency 
that  certainly  had  a  beginning  in  geologic  time  is 
equally  mysterious,  and  equally  beyond  the  reach 
of  the  chemical  and  physical  forces  as  we  know 
them  in  the  inorganic  world.  I  am  compelled  to 
think  of  this  impulse  as  inherent  in  matter,  and  as 
involved  in  the  physicochemical  forces,  but  I  am 

268 


LIFE  THE  TRAVELER 

aware  that  this  form  of  words  throws  no  hght  upon 
the  mystery. 

The  water  from  the  fountain  seeks  the  easiest 
course  to  the  lake  or  the  river;  the  river  seeks  the 
easiest  course  to  the  sea;  but  the  prime  cause  of 
its  seeking,  of  its  flowing,  is  the  mystery  we  call 
gravity.  Is  there  anything  in  the  constitution  of 
water,  or  in  the  laws  of  hydrostatics,  from  which 
we  could  predict  or  infer  the  tides,  did  we  not  look 
beyond  the  tides  and  beyond  the  earth  itself? 
Running  water  selects  the  sand,  the  silt,  the  gravel, 
from  the  soil,  and  deposits  each  in  separate  places, 
but  here  again  the  result  is  the  working  of  the  law 
of  gravity.  This  is  natural  selection  without  strug- 
gle or  competition.  Only  living  things  struggle. 
The  living  world  is  always  pitted  against  the  non- 
living, and  it  is  this  conflict  that  constitutes  the 
drama  of  evolution;  the  one  is  flexible,  adaptive, 
compromising;  the  other  is  rigid,  stereotyped,  re- 
morseless. Only  in  so  far  as  life  overcomes  and  uses 
the  obduracy  of  matter  is  it  life,  and  on  the  road  to 
development.  We  are  thus  compelled  to  speak  of 
life  as  an  entity,  as  we  do  of  gravity  and  chemical 
affinity,  when  in  the  one  case  as  in  the  other  we 
can  only  mean  a  specific  activity  or  tendency  in 
matter.  Science  with  its  rigid  methods  cuts  the 
ground  from  under  our  feet  and  we  have  recourse  to 
philosophy  to  save  ourselves  from  falling  into  the 
bottomless  abyss. 

269 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

II 

More  than  any  other  man  of  our  era,  Charles 
Darwin  has  contributed  to  the  tremendous  growth 
which  biological  science  has  made  in  our  time.  No 
matter  whether  his  theory  of  natural  selection  as 
an  adequate  explanation  of  the  origin  of  species 
stands  the  test  of  time  or  not,  it  aroused  men's 
minds  to  the  feasibility  of  the  subject  for  scientific 
investigation.    The  questions  Darwin  put  to  Na- 
ture were  all  fruitful  and  stimulating.    Whether 
he  got  the  right  answers  or  not,  he  showed  men 
how  to  question  and  cross-question  her,  and  showed 
that  she  was  not  so  dumb  as  we  had  thought. 
Darwin  loosed  the  whole  animal  world  from  its 
moorings  in  the  theory  of  the  fixity  of  species,  and 
set  it  afloat  on  the  sea  of  change.   His  solution  of 
the  origin  of  the  various  forms  is  bound  to  be 
greatly  modified,  may  be  negatived  altogether,  but 
he  did  a  mighty  service  to  biological  science  in 
simply  raising  the  question  of  their  instability,  and 
in  calling  attention  to  the  natural  grounds  upon 
which  their  stereotyped  characters  may  be  ques- 
tioned.  Life  is  so  fluid  and  elastic,  so  various  and 
adaptive,  that,  on  a  priori  grounds,  one  would  say 
that  species  are  not  rigid  and  fixed.  Darwin's  proof 
that  they  are  not  is  overwhelming,  and  his  provi- 
sional explanation  of  how  their  origin  was  brought 
about  is  stimulating  if  not  convincing.    He  was  a 

270 


LIFE  THE  TRAVELER 

great,  honest,  patient,  penetrating  investigator,  and 
his  inquiries  put  biological  science  in  the  front  ranks 
of  the  great  sciences,  alongside  of  astronomy  and 
geology,  making  with  them  the  great  trinity  of 
sciences. 

Darwin  made  no  attempt  to  grapple  with  the 
question  of  the  nature  and  origin  of  life  itself,  but 
only  with  the  evolution  of  the  many  forms  of  life. 
He  was  not  a  laboratory  naturalist,  but  a  student 
of  the  drama  of  animate  nature  as  it  is  enacted 
on  the  earth's  surface.  He  held  to  the  special  and 
miraculous  creation  theory  of  his  fathers,  but 
limited  it  to  one  or  more  forms.  Out  of  this  begin- 
ning he  thought,  through  the  fortuitous  operation 
of  natural  selection,  all  the  myriad  forms  of  life 
have  been  evolved.  This  is  Darwinism  in  its  sim- 
plest terms  —  a  miraculous  beginning  of  life,  but 
a  natural  unfolding.  Is  it  not  like  asking  us  to 
credit  the  immaculate  conception,  followed  by  the 
birth  of  a  normal  baby,  and  its  normal  development 
into  child  and  man? 

Darwin  formed  his  ideas  of  natural  selection 
upon  artificial  selection,  but  the  two  are  funda- 
mentally unlike.  There  is  an  active  agent  involved 
in  the  one  case,  which  has  specific  and  limited  ends 
to  attain,  and  hence  which  thwarts  the  tendencies 
of  nature.  But  what  is  the  active  agent  correspond- 
ing to  man,  in  the  other?  Natural  selection  is  the 
name  for  a  process  set  going  and  kept  going  by  the 

271 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

evolutionary  impulse.  It  is  natural  rejection  as 
well.  It  is  not  an  arbitrary  interference  with  the 
course  of  nature,  like  artificial  selection.  It  is  not 
the  name  of  a  force  or  of  an  active  principle,  as 
seems  so  often  implied,  but  an  explanation  of  the 
survival  of  the  fittest,  or  the  best  equipped,  for  the 
natural  competitions  of  life.  Artificial  selection  is 
man  at  the  helm  guiding  the  vessel;  natural  selec- 
tion, on  Darwin's  own  theory  of  fortuitous  varia- 
tion, is  like  a  fleet  of  vessels  unequally  equipped,  all 
drifting  with  the  wind  and  tide,  and  only  the  most 
stanch  and  seaworthy  ones  by  good  luck  reaching 
some  port. 

When  Darwin  declares  that  "if  organic  beings 
had  not  possessed  an  inherent  tendency  to  vary, 
man  could  have  done  nothing"  in  modifying  species 
or  in  developing  new  ones,  he  unwittingly  takes 
the  process  of  evolution  out  of  the  mechanical  or 
automatic  series,  and  places  it  in  another  and  higher 
order;  he  recognizes  the  original  push  of  life  which 
is  the  central  thought  of  Bergson*s  "Creative  Evo- 
lution.*' Variability  is  certainly  a  characteristic  of 
living  bodies  to  an  extent  and  in  a  sense  that  it 
is  not  characteristic  of  non-living.  Creative  evolu- 
tion is  only  the  principle  of  growth  illustrated  by 
the  whole  biological  series;  there  is  the  inherent 
tendency  to  grow,  to  develop,  which  is  character- 
istic of  all  life.  It  may  be  true  that  the  initial  varia- 
tion is  caused  by  slight  changes  in  the  conditions 

272 


LIFE  THE  TRAVELER 

of  life,  yet  the  variations  could  not  be  initiated  in 
a  non-growing,  a  non-vital,  a  non-developing  body. 
Darwin  had  a  vision  of  spontaneously  varying 
organisms,  the  form  their  variations  should  take 
determined  by  outward  conditions,  or  contingent 
upon  them,  but  the  inward  push  and  plasticity  of 
life  is  implied  in  his  theories.  He  saw  a  world  of 
living  forms  arise  and  people  the  earth  under  the 
action  of  natural  selection,  but  natural  selection 
working  on  an  ever-growing,  expanding,  irrepress- 
ible, self-renewing  vital  impulse.  Natural  selec- 
tion can  do  nothing  w^ithout  variation,  and  varia- 
tion springs  from  an  inherent  tendency  to  vary. 
Outward  conditions  determine  in  the  same  way 
the  course  and  the  form  that  water  from  a  foun- 
tain shall  assume,  but  it  plays  no  part  in  the  push- 
ing and  flowing  properties  of  the  water  itself.  Dar- 
win took  pains  to  say  that  "there  is  no  innate  or 
necessary  tendency  in  each  being  to  its  own  ad- 
vancement in  the  scale  of  organization,"  but  is  not 
the  innate  tendency  to  vary  the  first  step  in  this 
advancement? 

None  of  man's  ways  throw  light  on  Nature's 
ways.  Man  works  to  specific  or  partial  ends.  Na- 
ture works  to  universal  ends.  Artificial  selection 
throws  no  light  on  natural  selection,  because  man 
singles  out  one  or  more  forms  and  favors  them 
against  all  others,  whereas  Nature  favors  all  forms 
and  multiplies  her  types  endlessly.    She  has  no 

273 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

choice  of  types,  but  favors  the  more  perfect  of  a 
given  type  as  against  the  imperfect.  The  weak  and 
the  strong  in  animal  Hfe  ahke  succeed  if  each  is 
complete,  or  well  equipped  of  its  kind;  the  mouse 
gets  on  as  well  as  the  lion,  if  it  is  a  perfect  mouse. 
The  weak,  the  unfit,  fall  out  because  of  their  scant 
measm-e  of  life-force.  Natural  selection  works  to 
harden  and  confirm  a  species,  but  plays  no  part  in 
originating  it. 

If  the  unfit  arrives,  it  is  cut  off  by  the  stress  of  the 
struggle  for  life,  but  it  is  unfit  only  so  far  as  it  is 
malformed  or  feeble;  the  unfit  in  any  other  sense 
never  arrives.  I  saw  a  two-headed  trout  recently 
in  a  collection  of  several  hundred  thousand  finger- 
lings.  It  was  a  year  old.  It  was  unfit  to  survive, 
and  in  a  state  of  nature  would  soon  have  perished, 
but  it  had  been  isolated  and  carefully  looked  after. 
Artificial  selection  had  preserved  it.  How  long  it 
can  preserve  it  against  natural  selection  is  a  ques- 
tion. Tumbler  and  pouter  and  fan-tailed  pigeons 
are  all  preserved  by  artificial  selection  against  the 
working  of  natural  selection.  Nature's  interest  lies 
not  in  such  extreme  forms,  but  in  forms  nearer  the 
mean  —  the  rock  dove,  the  wood  pigeon,  the  band- 
tailed  pigeon,  and  the  like.  The  myriad  forms  of 
fish  in  the  water,  of  birds  and  insects  in  the  air,  of 
quadrupeds  and  bipeds  on  the  land,  are  all  equally 
fit  to  survive  and  do  survive,  because  each  has  its 
full  measure  of  life,  and  finds  its  place  in  the  total 

274 


LIFE  THE  TRxVVELER 

scheme  of  life.  If  the  invertebrate  gave  rise  to  the 
vertebrate,  or  the  reptile  gave  rise  to  the  bird,  or 
the  lower  mammals  gave  rise  to  the  higher,  it  was 
not  because  the  former  were  mifit  to  survive;  they 
did  survive,  and  still  survive,  but  because  the 
evolutionary  impulse  is  inherent  in  the  first  forms 
of  life,  and  was  stimulated,  rather  than  stamj)ed 
out,  by  the  vicissitudes  of  time.  "No  statement  of 
the  universe,"  says  the  wise  Emerson,  "can  have 
any  soundness  that  does  not  admit  of  its  ascending 
effort."  Is  it  thinkable  that  man  could  have  arisen 
from  the  manlike  apes  by  the  mere  clash  and  fric- 
tion of  an  irrational  environment  alone?  Is  one 
man  superior  to  another  by  reason  of  outward 
conditions,  and  the  discipline  of  life  alone?  Is  the 
secret  of  Plato  or  Paul  or  Shakespeare  or  Lincoln 
in  the  keeping  of  pans  and  pots?  Man  arose  from 
his  humbler  ancestors  because  the  manward  im- 
pulse, in  some  way  beyond  our  ken,  was  inherent 
in  the  evolutionary  impulse.  Man  was  potential 
in  the  monkey.  He  might  never  have  arrived  had 
the  race  of  apes,  or  some  kindred  tree-living  form, 
been  cut  off,  say  in  Oligocene  times.  But  it  was  not 
cut  off,  and  here  we  are,  and  rather  ashamed  of  our 
forebears.  One  has  to  say  that  all  other  forms  of 
life,  down  to  the  flea  and  the  cockroach,  were  also 
potential  in  the  life-impulse  —  the  enemies  of  man 
as  well  as  his  friends. 

The  three-toed  woodpecker  evidently  gets  on  as 

275 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

well  as  the  four-toed;  the  downy  as  well  as  his 
larger  and  more  powerful  brother,  the  hairy;  the 
creepers  and  the  nuthatches,  with  their  slender 
beaks,  as  well  as  those  with  powerful  beaks;  animals 
without  legs,  as  snakes,  as  well  as  animals  with 
legs;  and  the  bipeds  flourish  as  well  as  the  quad- 
rupeds; birds  without  the  power  of  flight  also  flour- 
ish; animals  with  horns  succeed  no  better  than  ani- 
mals without  horns.  Natural  selection  works  in 
each  species,  weeding  out  the  weak  and  the  imper- 
fect, but  the  competition  among  species  has  only 
the  effect  of  clinching  and  developing  the  species, 
not  in  originating  new  ones. 

The  struggle  for  life,  outside  of  man's  disturb- 
ing influence,  is  not  so  much  a  struggle  of  the  weak 
against  the  strong,  or  of  one  form  against  another, 
as  it  is  a  struggle  of  the  plant  or  animal  with  its 
environment.  K  there  were  but  one  plant,  or  one 
animal,  or  one  tree  on  the  earth,  the  life  of  that  one 
individual  would  be  a  struggle,  much  more,  of 
course,  in  some  parts  of  the  earth,  and  in  certain 
climates,  than  in  others,  and  the  severer  the  strug- 
gle within  certain  limits,  the  greater  the  tenacity 
of  life.  An  oak-tree  growing  amid  the  rocks  and 
on  a  scanty  soil  has  tougher  fibre  but  less  size  and 
grace  of  form  than  the  tree  growing  on  an  alluvial 
plain.  A  life  is  made  strong  by  the  obstacles  it 
overcomes.  We  do  not  feel  the  force  of  the  wind  or 
the  tide  when  we  go  with  them.  The  balloonist  rides 

276 


LIFE  THE  TRAVELER 

in  a  profound  calm.  Life  is  a  struggle  always.  Only 
living  things  struggle;  in  the  organic  world  alone 
is  there  an  activity  that  is  an  effort.  There  is  ac- 
tivity in  all  matter,  visible  and  invisible  activity, 
the  end  of  which  is  to  reach  an  equilibrium. 

The  key-word  of  evolution  is  organic  effort,  the 
inherent  impetus  of  life.  No  conjuring  with  merely 
mechanical  forces  can,  in  my  opinion,  account  for 
the  upward  or  aspiring  tendency  of  organic  nature. 
Life  struggled  out  of  the  fish  into  the  reptile,  and 
out  of  the  reptile  into  the  bird,  but  left  these  forms 
still  flourishing  behind  it.  According  to  natural 
selection  these  unfit  forms  ought  all  to  have  gone 
out.  The  fish  is  as  fit  to  survive  as  the  reptile,  and 
the  reptile  as  fit  as  the  bird  and  the  mammal,  and 
the  mammal  as  fit  as  man;  the  invertebrate  as  fit 
as  the  vertebrate.  The  individuals  of  these  species 
that  do  not  survive  are  cut  off  by  accident  largely, 
then  by  reason  of  low  vitality,  or  a  scant  measure 
of  life.  The  competition  with  other  living  forms 
plays  only  a  secondary  part.  I  fancy  that  all  the 
animals  of  any  and  every  kind  that  are  well  born, 
that  is,  with  a  normal  life  -  endowment,  thrive 
equally  well  and  survive  equally  well,  except  so  far 
as  accident  enters  into  the  problem.  If  food  is 
scarce,  they  go  hungry  together,  until  those  en- 
feebled by  age  and  other  things  are  eliminated. 

The  variations  which  lead  up  to  the  formation 
of  a  new  species  are  so  insensible,  they  stretch  over 

277 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

such  a  vast  period  of  time,  that  their  survival  value 
from  generation  to  generation  is  and  must  be  very 
slight. 

Take  the  case  of  the  horse,  for  instance.  The 
development  of  the  horse  seems  to  stretch  over  a 
period  of  at  least  three  millions  of  years,  or  from  the 
eohippus  of  Eocene  times,  an  animal  less  than  two 
feet  high,  and  probably  weighing  less  than  one 
hundred  pounds,  to  the  horse  of  later  Tertiary 
times,  the  pliohippus,  much  like  the  superb  crea- 
ture we  know  to-day,  five  feet  high,  and  weighing 
ten  or  twelve  hundred  pounds.  If  this  animal  in- 
creased in  height  only  one  quarter  of  an  inch  in 
ten  thousand  years,  he  would  be  six  feet  high  in 
less  than  two  million  years.  So  if  we  allow  him  three 
million  years  to  develop  in,  his  increase  in  height 
must  have  been  even  less  than  one  fourth  of  an 
inch  in  ten  thousand  years.  Think  of  it !  Our  horse 
of  to-day  might  be  increasing  or  diminishing  in 
size  at  that  rate  and  the  fact  never  be  noticed  dur- 
ing the  whole  historic  period.  In  weight  the  same; 
one  eighth  of  a  pound  in  one  hundred  years,  and 
he  would  weigh  fourteen  thousand  pounds  in  less 
than  two  million  years,  a  rate  of  increase  that  our 
scales  would  hardly  detect  in  a  century  of  time. 
The  transformations  of  the  other  animals  have 
probably  been  equally  slow.  Science  would  feel 
safe  in  saying  that  a  flying  fish  never  becomes  a 
bird,  but  can  we  conceive  how  slight  the  change 

278 


LIFE  THE  TRAVELER 

would  have  to  be  in  every  one  thousand  years  to 
bring  it  about  in  geologic  or  biologic  time? 

Where  does  such  an  estimate  leave  natural  selec- 
tion? Of  what  survival  advantage  to  the  eohippus 
could  the  gain  of  an  inch  in  height  in  forty  thou- 
sand years,  or  of  one  pound  of  weight  in  four  hun- 
dred years,  amount  to?  Such  an  application  of 
mathematics  to  the  problems  of  evolution  leaves 
us  with  the  conviction  that  there  is  something  else 
at  work  besides  natural  selection.  Could  natural 
selection  work  on  a  capital  of  a  gain  of  the  one  one- 
hundredth  of  an  inch  in  height  in  four  hundred 
years?  —  assuming,  of  course,  that  the  gain  was 
uniform.  Must  there  not  have  been  an  inherent 
tendency  to  increase  in  size  and  to  all  the  various 
modifications  —  a  primal  push,  as  Bergson  urges? 
With  man  it  has,  no  doubt,  been  the  same.  His 
evolution  has  been  so  infinitely  slow,  that  the  me- 
chanical conception  of  it  is  utterly  inadequate.  It 
is  very  certain  that  his  line  of  descent  in  Miocene 
times  was  through  a  small  animal  form  probably 
no  larger  than  a  new-born  baby. 

Or  take  the  case  of  the  elephant.  These  forms 
changed  and  enlarged  under  the  discipline  of  their 
environment,  the  augmenting  force  or  impulse 
within  always  meeting  and  filling  the  changing 
needs  from  without.  The  size  of  the  channel  of  the 
stream  kept  pace  with  the  increasing  size  of  the 
stream.  The  stream  branches  or  divides  when  some 

279 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

obstacle  intervenes;  but  the  obstacle  does  not  ac- 
count for  the  new  branch,  but  only  for  the  form  it 
takes  and  the  direction  it  flows.  The  four-toed 
horse  was  evidently  just  as  fit  to  survive  as  the  one- 
toed,  as  is  evinced  by  the  fact  that  it  did  survive 
for  millions  of  years,  but  it  eventuated  in  a  series 
of  progressive  forms  because  of  the  push  of  life 
meeting  and  utilizing  the  changing  outward  con- 
ditions. 

Life  got  out  of  the  sea  upon  the  land  and  devel- 
oped lungs  instead  of  gills,  and  legs  instead  of  fins, 
not  because  the  competition  in  the  sea  drove  it  out, 
but  because  of  this  primal  push  and  aspiration  to 
new  forms. 

Life  is  so  flexible  and  adaptive,  the  table  which 
Nature  spreads  for  her  creatures  is  so  varied  and 
bountiful,  that  the  most  delicate  and  minute  forms 
survive  as  well  as  the  large  and  powerful,  and 
finally  outlast  them.  Size  and  strength  count  in 
the  arena  where  they  are  the  determining  factors.  If 
other  things  did  not  count,  the  vast  army  of  lesser 
creatures,  with  man  at  their  head,  would  not  have 
been  here.  The  early  gigantic  forms  did  not  pre- 
vail. The  savage  and  powerful  carnivorous  ani- 
mals do  not  exterminate  the  weaker  herbivorous. 
Professor  Bailey  well  says  that  "the  minor  things 
and  the  weak  things  are  the  most  numerous,  and 
they  have  played  the  greatest  part  in  the  polity  of 
nature."    "The  whole  contrivance  of  Nature  is  to 

280 


LIFE  THE  TRAVELER 

protect  the  weak."  Rather,  I  should  say,  Nature 
has  a  thousand  contrivances  to  protect  the  weak 
and  defenseless. 

Henri  Bergson's  conception  of  the  creative 
energy  as  struggling  with  matter,  hami)ered  and 
delayed,  and  often  defeated  by  it,  subject  to  what 
we  call  chance  or  contingency,  like  us  mortals, 
taking  half  a  loaf  when  it  cannot  get  a  whole  one, 
seems  to  be  a  fruitful  conception  in  explaining  the 
condition  of  life  as  we  see  it,  past  and  present,  on 
this  planet.  There  has  been  a  steady  struggle  and 
progression  toward  higher  forms  from  the  first. 
The  creative  energy  shows  itself  to  be  very  human, 
very  fallible,  often  vacillating  and  short-sighted. 
Indeed,  man  is  the  image  of  his  maker  in  this  re- 
spect. God  has  gone  on  with  his  work  very  much 
as  man  goes  on  with  his  —  blundering,  experiment- 
ing, but  doing  the  best  he  could.  I  spent  an  hour  in 
a  medical  museum  recently  and  was  nearly  made 
sick  by  what  I  saw  there  —  such  failures,  such  mon- 
strosities, such  miscarriages  of  life,  such  deformities, 
such  evidence  of  pain  and  agony,  men  no  more 
exempt  in  this  respect  than  pigs  or  monkeys,  chil- 
dren impotent  to  be  born,  or  brainless,  or  with  only 
one  eye.  What  did  it  all  mean?  It  meant,  if  it  meant 
anything,  that  the  life-impulse,  or  life-energy,  was 
subject  to  the  accidents  and  uncertainties  of  time 
and  chance,  before  birth  as  after,  and  that  we  are 
part  of  a  system  of  things  that  seems  struggling  to 

281 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

a  goal,  but  is  delayed  i"n  reaching  it,  and,  further- 
more, that  the  goal  is  not  an  end  in  itself.  The  Eter- 
nal seems  to  indulge  creative  energy  just  as  an 
artist  does  for  the  sake  of  self-expression  —  the 
joy  of  creation.  The  cosmic  energy  seems  to  have 
no  other  end  than  this.  It  fills  the  world  with  life 
just  to  see  it  struggle  and  develop.  The  earth  is 
a  canvas  of  living  pigments,  or  a  page  of  living 
words,  or  a  score  of  living  chords,  and  the  picture 
or  the  poem  or  the  symphony  is  for  the  joy  of  self- 
activity.  The  picture  is  in  high  lights  and  low 
lights,  it  is  shaded  with  suffering  and  pain  and  fail- 
ure; the  poem  halts  and  is  full  of  dull  and  prosaic 
as  well  as  of  lyric  passages;  the  symphony  is  full 
of  discords  as  well  as  of  harmonies. 

Ill 

Nothing  is  plainer,  I  think,  than  that  forms  of 
life  of  the  same  species  begin  life  with  different 
degrees  of  vitality,  whatever  that  may  be.  Of  a 
thousand  spears  of  corn  in  May,  some  will  stand 
a  frost  better  than  others;  nine  hundred  may  be 
killed  and  one  hundred  may  live.  The  same  is  true 
of  many  other  plants.  Occasionally  a  severe  freeze 
in  May  will  kill  ninety  or  ninety-five  per  cent  of 
the  young  shoots  on  a  grapevine.  Expose  a  thou- 
sand babies  six  months  old  to  the  same  test, 
and  the  result  will  probably  be  as  variable;  a 
fraction  of  them  will  survive  a  test  that  would 

282 


LIFE  THE  TRA\^LER 

prove  fatal  to  the  majority.  Of  a  thousand  eggs  of 
any  bird  or  fowl  subjected  to  the  same  test,  a  few 
will  pull  through  when  the  majority  will  perish. 
In  a  state  of  nature,  of  course,  the  exposure  to  the 
cold  will  be  greater  in  some  cases  than  in  others, 
and  the  test  of  endurance  will  not  be  equal,  but 
I  am  thinking  of  equality  of  exposure.  Or,  sub- 
ject any  number  of  living  animals  or  men  to  test 
trials  of  labor  or  of  cold,  or  of  deprivation  of  food, 
and  a  few  of  each  will  distance  the  majority.  Of 
our  various  kinds  of  farm  and  garden  seeds,  ninety 
or  more  per  cent  w^ill,  under  the  right  conditions  of 
soil,  warmth,  and  moisture,  sprout  the  first  season; 
usually  less  than  fifty  per  cent,  the  second  season, 
and  a  still  smaller  percentage,  the  third  season;  all  of 
which  indicates  the  different  degrees  of  vital  power 
which  living  things  possess.  No  doubt  the  secret 
resides  in  certain  peculiar  properties  of  the  somatic 
cells  or  of  their  arrangement  —  which  is  past  finding 
out.  The  races  of  all  forms  of  life  have  been  tested 
in  some  such  way  by  outward  conditions  for  untold 
ages,  and  the  weaker  have  been  eliminated.  The 
process  has  resulted  in  deepening  the  hold  of  each 
upon  life,  or  has  increased  their  hardiness,  till  life 
is  as  we  see  it  to-day.  Man  interferes  with  this 
weeding-out  process  in  his  own  species;  the  weak 
are  shielded  and  preserved,  and  the  fund  of  vitality 
of  the  whole  is  thus  depleted.  It  is  no  figure  of 
speech  to  say  of  certain  men  that  they  have  a  deep 

283 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

hold  upon  life,  —  an  abounding,  or  plus,  vitality,  — 
while  the  opposite  is  true  of  others.   In  a  brood  of 
chickens  or  a  litter  of  pigs  or  of  puppies  this  in- 
equality of  the  gift  of  vitality  is  often  very  pro- 
nounced;  it   of    course    has   its    prenatal   causes, 
but  they  are  involved  in  the  hidden  activities  of 
the  cells.    The  term  "a  good  constitution"  has  a 
scientific  value,  though  quite  beyond  the  tests  of 
scientific  analysis.  The  term  "constitution"  is  only 
a  name  for  a  certain  totality  of  physical  endowment, 
as  the  word  "vitality"  is  only  a  name  for  certain 
activities  in  matter;  but  if  the  latter  has  no  stand- 
ing in  the  court  of  science  or  of  philosophy,  neither 
could  the  former  have  standing.    Yet  how  very 
real  both  are  to  us.  The  diathesis  of  a  person  —  his 
predisposition  to  certain  diseases  —  is  a  very  real 
factor  in  his  physical  life.    No  doubt  by  artificial 
or  arbitrary  selection  a  race  of  very  long-lived  men 
might  be  developed.    By   allowing  only  the  off- 
spring of  long-lived  parents  to  marry,  the  term  of 
human  life  could  doubtless  be  greatly  lengthened. 
But  Nature  does  not  work  on  this  plan.   She  con- 
stantly crosses  these  opposite  tendencies,  because 
her  solicitude  is  not  about  the  few,  the  exceptional, 
but  about  the  many,  or  the  average.   Tall  men  are 
prone   to  marry   short  women,  one   temperament 
to  unite  with  its  complementary,  the  robust  with 
the  delicate.  Robert  Browning  marries  the  invalid 
Elizabeth  Barrett.    In  the  human  species  Nature 

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LIFE  THE  TRAVELER 

thus  brings  up  the  average,  and  prevents  the  too 
great  dominance  of  any  one  type. 

The  struggle  of  hfe  with  hfe  results  in  deepening 
the  hold  of  both  sides  upon  life,  because  it  increases 
effort.  It  develops  cunning,  it  develops  sjx^ed,  it 
develops  strength,  it  develops  weapons.  The  weak, 
those  whose  measure  of  life  is  scant,  fail  or  fall  out. 
It  is  not  this  struggle  that  develops  new  species;  it 
is  this  struggle  that  hardens  and  perfects  species; 
it  eliminates  the  unfit,  but  does  it  hasten  the  fit? 
No  scientific  explanation  of  this  fullness  of  life, 
this  power  of  adaptation,  is  possible.  The  resist- 
ance of  the  environment,  or  of  outward  obstacles, 
may  account  for  variation,  as  the  obstacles  in  the 
way  of  a  stream  of  water  account  for  the  form 
and  changing  course  of  the  stream;  but  it  does  not 
account  for  the  onward  flow  or  the  constant  push 
of  the  w^ater  —  only  the  inherent  nature  of  water 
and  gravitation  account  for  this.  Indeed,  the  full 
genesis  of  the  fountain  and  flowing  stream  involves 
the  sun,  the  clouds,  the  rains,  the  shape  of  the  land 
surfaces,  and  the  break  in  the  deadlock  of  the  ele- 
ments which  all  these  things  bring  about.  Science 
easily  sees  through  this  riddle,  but  the  explanation 
of  the  organic  effort  that  seems  to  pervade  nature 
is,  in  its  final  terms,  beyond  the  reach  of  science. 
Science  can  duplicate  or  repeat  the  formation  of 
the  fountain  and  the  stream,  even  to  the  formation 
of  water  from  its  two  constituent  gases,  but   it 

285 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

cannot  repeat  the  genesis  of  living  matter  without 
the  aid  of  other  hving  matter.  The  cows  in  the  pas- 
ture crop  off  the  tender  shoots  of  the  young  red- 
thorn  and  apple-trees,  and  thus  increase  the  strug- 
gle of  the  sapling  to  become  a  tree.  They  do  not 
eliminate  it;  they  retard  its  growth  and  add  to  its 
toughness. 

All  these  considerations  illustrate  how  living 
things  struggle  with  and  against  one  another  and 
survive.  All  the  grasses  and  the  herbs  of  the  field 
struggle  in  the  same  way.  If  they  are  exterminated, 
it  is  usually  by  fire  or  by  flood,  or  by  protracted 
drought,  or  other  elemental  agencies.  But  not  al- 
ways. The  chestnut  blight  which  has  lately  attacked 
our  chestnut- trees  threatens  to  exterminate  the 
whole  race;  the  potato-beetle  would  doubtless,  if  left 
alone,  exterminate  the  potato;  the  currant-worm, 
exterminate  the  currant;  but  these  pests  would 
not  be  factors  in  developing  new  species.  There 
would  be  no  survival  of  the  fittest;  all  would  go. 
With  the  myriad  forms  of  life  that  have  become 
extinct  during  the  geologic  ages,  doubtless  similar 
agents  were  at  work;  enemies  or  unfavorable  con- 
ditions, or  some  mysterious  failure  in  the  springs 
of  life,  have  led  to  their  disappearance.  Natural 
selection  has  played  no  part.  Adaptation  implies 
adaptability  —  something  fluid  and  mobile  —  which 
is  characteristic  of  life.  Osborn  says  that  certain 
characters   are   adaptive  from  their  first  appear- 

286 


.0% 


LIFE  THE  TRAVELER 

ance.  Are  not  all  characters  adaptive  from  the 
first?  Do  not  all  organs  have  an  inherent  tendency 
to  shape  themselves  for  the  use  of  the  organism? 
Does  natural  selection  do  any  pruning  here?  The 
eye,  from  its  first  appearance  as  a  pigmented  spot 
in  the  earliest  form,  is  adapted  for  seeing,  the  ear 
for  hearing,  the  teeth  for  cutting  and  grinding.  Life 
knows  what  it  wants  from  the  start.  I  do  not  be- 
lieve that  there  is  any  blind  groping  in  the  organ- 
ism. The  blind  groping  begins  when  the  organism 
begins  to  live,  or  to  find  its  way  in  the  world.  Then 
it  comes  in  contact  with  blind  forces  whose  cooper- 
ation it  needs,  but  which  heed  it  not.  Then  it  must 
fit  itself  to  its  environment  by  the  trial-and-error 
process. 

The  winds  and  air-currents  do  help  to  explain 
the  w^inged  seeds,  but  do  not  help  to  explain  why 
Nature  is  so  much  more  solicitous  about  some 
seeds  than  about  others.  What  a  beautiful  and 
ingenious  device  is  the  delicate  parachute  of  the 
dandelion-seed,  and  the  balloon  of  the  thistle!  but 
scores  of  other  troublesome  plants  have  no  such 

device. 

What  possible  advantage  can  it  be  to  the  honey- 
bee that  it  should  lose  its  sting,  and  hence  its  life, 
in  the  wound  it  inflicts  —  any  more  than  it  would 
be  to  the  advantage  of  a  man  to  lose  his  sword  in 
the  flesh  of  his  enemy,  and  have  his  arm  pulled  out 
of  the  socket  into  the  bargain?    The  wasps  and 

287 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

hornets  and  bumblebees  live  to  sting  another  day; 
why  should  this  cruel  fate  attend  only  the  honey- 
bee? Why  should  the  drone  fertilize  the  queen  at 
the  cost  of  his  own  life?  Where  is  the  gain  to  the 
swarm?  Where  does  natural  selection  come  in? 

When  we  begin  to  ask  the  whys  and  the  where- 
fores of  Nature's  doings,  our  human  standards  soon 
fail  us.  No  plummet  can  sound  these  depths.  Why 
does  one  species  often  destroy  another,  or  why  a 
parasite  exterminate  its  host  and  thus  exterminate 
itself? 

There  are  no  rational  checks  in  Nature  —  all  is 
left  to  chance;  and  the  scheme  works  because  Na- 
ture has  all  power  and  all  time.  There  is  no  other, 
no  rival.  The  All  can  go  its  own  way;  to  play  the 
game,  to  win  and  lose  —  the  stakes  are  Nature's 
in  any  event. 

Our  little  plans  and  wants  are  specific,  individ- 
ual, but  our  activities  are  hemmed  in  by  general 
laws  which  work  to  no  special  end.  We  row  and 
steam  against  the  currents  and  against  the  winds; 
we  check  or  thwart  or  control  the  natural  forces: 
this  is  life  as  opposed  to  gravity;  but  life  could  not 
oppose  gravity  without  the  aid  of  gravity.  Thus 
are  we  a  part  of  that  from  which  we  seek  to  detach 
ourselves,  and  are  kept  going  by  the  force  we  seek 
to  overcome. 


T 


XV 

GREAT  QUESTIONS  IN  LITTLE 

I.    THE   ETHER 

0  speak  of  invisible  raj's  of  light  seems  a  con- 
tradiction of  terms,  and  so  it  would  be  were 
light  rays  an  objective  reality  instead  of  an  experi- 
ence of  our  consciousness.  The  dark,  or  heat,  rays 
of  the  spectrum  are  as  real  as  the  light  rays,  but  we 
see  them  not  because  om*  eye  is  not  attuned  to 
them,  or  in  their  key.  It  is  said  that  the  Leyden 
jar  emits  rays  that  obey  all  the  laws  of  optics,  but 
the  eye  is  no  wiser  for  it.  Light  is  created  in  the 
eye,  as  sound  is  born  in  the  ear.  Certain  vibrations 
in  the  ether  give  us  a  sensation  that  we  name 
"light";  certain  vibrations  in  the  air  give  us  sensa- 
tions that  we  call  "sound."  All  the  color  in  nature 
is  the  result  of  what  the  vibrations  reflected  from 
objects  do  to  the  eye,  just  as  all  we  call  sound  is  the 
result  of  what  certain  mechanical  disturbances  in 
the  air  do  to  the  ear.  There  is  no  color  in  the  dark 
and  there  is  no  sound  in  a  vacuum.  We  can  sot  up 
a  mechanical  disturbance  in  the  air,  but  wo  cannot 
set  up  a  mechanical  disturbance  in  the  other,  1h'- 
cause  the  ether  is  not  a  tangible  body.  It  dvWcs 
all  our  definitions  of  tangible  bodies.    No  dc\icc  or 

289 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

experiment  of  man  has  as  yet  been  able  to  detect 
it  or  prove  its  existence.  It  is  a  metaphysical 
necessity.  We  are  compelled  to  assume  its  exist- 
ence to  account  for  such  phenomena  as  light,  elec- 
tricity, and  gravity.  We  can  produce  a  vacuum  as 
regards  the  air,  but  not  as  regards  the  ether.  The 
ether  has  no  mechanical  reality.  It  is  the  negation 
of  all  mechanics,  of  all  matter.  The  physicists  are 
driven  to  the  necessity  of  describing  matter  as  a 
hole  in  the  ether.  But  how  can  there  be  a  hole  in 
that  which  is  the  negation  of  matter?  It  is  like 
trying  to  think  of  a  hole  within  a  hole,  or  a  nest  of 
holes,  like  a  nest  of  boxes.  But  our  scientific  phi- 
losophers are  not  disturbed  by  such  things.  Neces>- 
sity  in  science,  as  in  war,  knows  no  law,  and  our  need 
for  the  ether  is  so  great  that  we  must  have  it  even 
if  it  negatives  all  the  rest  of  our  knowledge.  It  is, 
so  to  speak,  the  connective  tissue  of  the  cosmos,  it 
makes  the  cosmos  one  and  inseparable.  It  is  the 
unchangeable,  the  all-present,  the  everlasting.  It 
satisfies  the  needs  of  the  mind  for  an  all-embracing 
reality,  for  a  primal  stuff  out  of  which  all  things 
arose,  for  an  immaterial  reality  which  is  the  par- 
ent and  master  of  matter.  It  is  the  sea  of  energy 
in  which  the  cosmos  floats.  It  affords  the  key  to 
the  well-authenticated  cases  of  mind-reading,  telep- 
athy, and  all  genuine  occult  phenomena.  It  gives 
us  a  glimpse  behind  the  veil  of  things;  it  adds  a 
new  chapter  of  wonders  to  this  universe  of  wonders 

290 


GREAT  QUESTIONS  IN  LITTLE 

—  wonders  "beneath  wonders  everywhere;  it  sup- 
pYies  the  missing  hnk  between  matter  and  spirit; 
it  helps  us  to  understand  the  unity  of  things  —  that 
all  are  of  one  stuff,  that  near  and  remote  are  the 
same,  that  celestial  and  terrestrial  join  hands;  it 
helps  us  to  grasp  the  phenomena  of  magnetism,  of 
electricity,  and  of  gravity,  and  of  the  vital  inter- 
change, so  to  speak,  between  all  the  hosts  of  heaven. 
"Not  a  hawthorn  blooms,"  says  Victor  Hugo,  "but 
is  felt  at  the  stars."  If  the  ether  is  a  reality,  this  may 
be  true.  "The  divine  ship"  (the  earth),  says  Whit- 
man, "sails  the  divine  seas."  The  ether  is  this 
shoreless  and  soundless  sea  —  the  sea  in  which  all 
worlds  and  systems  float  like  bubbles. 

II.    NATURAL   SELECTION 

Darwin  could  not  believe  that  man  was  the  re- 
sult of  chance,  neither  can  any  of  us  reach  that 
conclusion  in  the  terms  in  which  we  at  present  do 
our  thinking.  It  is  unthinkable.  If  we  suppose  that 
an  accidental  meeting  or  a  clash  of  the  molecules 
of  inert  matter  resulted  in  the  lowest  forms  of  life, 
how  are  we  to  get  these  myriads  of  living  forms 
from  the  amoeba  up  to  man,  out  of  the  aimless 
struggle  and  jostling  of  living  cells,  unless  the  cells 
know  what  they  want,  or  work  according  to  some 
plan  or  purpose?  How  can  there  be  any  progress 
toward  higher  forms,  any  cooperation  among  these 
minute  living  units,  such  as  we  actually  see,   la 

291 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

building  up  organs  and  parts  more  and  more  com- 
plex, till  the  earth  is  peopled  with  intelligent  be- 
ings? Must  there  not  be  some  kind  of  method  in 
the  madness  of  molecular  activities,  in  the  chaotic 
rush  and  whirl  of  the  atoms  and  electrons,  some 
purposive  arrangement  and  direction,  in  order  that 
so  wonderful  a  mechanism  as  even  a  flea  or  a 
fly  may  result?  What  the  directing  and  organizing 
agent  is,  or  whether  or  not  there  is  any  such  agent 
or  power  that  can  be  described  and  referred  to  in 
these  terms,  is  one  of  the  fundamental  mysteries. 
According  to  the  terms  in  w^hich  we  do  our  think- 
ing, nothing  can  create  itself,  and  yet  in  the  con- 
cepts of  a  non-teleological  universe,  we  cannot  ad- 
mit any  objective  power  or  influence  apart  from 
Nature  herself. 

An  eye,  for  instance,  is  a  very  convenient  thing 
for  an  animal  to  have,  but  how  could  natural  selec- 
tion, or  the  mere  struggle  of  life,  have  brought  it 
about?  Nothing  is  planning  an  eye,  or  thinking 
about  it,  or  feeling  the  want  of  it,  in  the  chaos  of 
a  world  of  chance.  The  organism  is  jostled  about 
here  and  there,  and  yet  in  due  time  the  eye  with 
all  its  wonderful  powers  and  adaptation  appears. 
It  is  of  use  when  developed,  but  must  there  not 
have  been  a  long  preliminary  stage  in  its  develop- 
ment when  it  was  of  no  use?  It  began  as  a  faint 
pigmented  spot  in  the  epidermis.  Was  this  pig- 
mented spot  of  any  service  to  the  organism?  Could 

292 


GREAT  QUESTIONS  IN  LITTLE 

natural  selection  favor  it  or  originate  it  before  it 
began  to  function?  Can  we  conceive  of  a  blind 
tendency  to  variation  as  hitting  upon  such  an  or- 
gan as  the  eye,  or  the  ear,  or  any  other  part  of  an 
organized  body?  If  we  grant  the  Darwinians  the 
body  to  start  with,  how  is  chance  variation  going 
to  give  it  an  eye  or  an  ear,  or  its  organs  of  secretion, 
and  the  like?  Could  any  possible  number  of  hit- 
and-miss  variations  give  it  one  of  these  things? 
And  during  their  incipient  stages,  of  what  advan- 
tage are  they  to  the  organism?  How  did  an  eyeless 
organism  chance  to  vary  toward  an  eye?  \Vho  or 
what  said  "eye"?  What  put  the  organism  in  mind 
of  it?  Its  needs?  But  would  it  not  be  very  useful 
sometimes  for  an  animal  to  be  able  to  live  without 
air  or  water?  Yet  they  develop  no  organs  that  en- 
able them  to  do  it.  They  have  needs  only  because 
they  are  living,  developing  beings.  Natural  selec- 
tion can  work  only  when  there  is  struggle  or  living 
competition.  It  cannot  create  the  current  by  which 
it  profits. 

III.  SPECULATION  AND  EXPERIMENT 

There  are  two  ways  of  attacking  a  problem,  the 
speculative  way  and  the  experimental  way.  The 
ancient  observers  almost  invariably  chose  the 
former  way.  This  is  the  way  of  children  and  of  all 
primitive  peoples,  and  of  the  larger  part  of  man- 
kind in  our  own  day.    It  is  the  natural  way.   The 

293 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

birth  of  science  began  when  men  took  up  the  experi- 
mental way. 

Look  into  Plutarch's  "Morals"  and  see  some  of 
the  questions  that  he  and  his  fellows  used  to  dis- 
cuss at  their  debating  clubs.  They  do  not  actually 
discuss  the  question  that  still  survives  among 
country  people,  "WTiy  does  the  sunlight  put  out 
the  fire?"  —  a  deception  of  the  eye  merely;  but 
many  of  their  discussions  were  upon  subjects  that 
a  little  experimentation  would  have  settled  at  once. 
Here  are  some  of  their  questions :  — 

Why  sea-water  will  not  put  out  fire?  Why  a  deer 
when  it  is  taken  sheds  salt  tears,  and  a  boar  sweet? 
A  wild  fig  being  bound  around  a  garden  fig-tree 
will  keep  the  fruit  from  falling  and  promote  its 
ripening.  Why  does  a  deer  bury  its  cast-off  horns? 
Why  does  a  goat  stop  the  entire  herd  by  holding  a 
branch  of  sea-holly  in  its  mouth?  Why  does  dew 
make  fat  people  lean?  Why  does  a  vessel  filled 
with  water  weigh  more  in  winter  than  in  summer? 
Why  are  waters  hottest  in  the  bottom  of  the  sea? 
(Because  heat  shuns  cold  and  fiees  to  the  bottom.) 
Why  is  the  flesh  of  sheep  bitten  by  wolves  sweeter 
than  that  of  others? 

Such  matters  of  dispute  show  the  childish  va- 
garies of  the  human  mind  before  the  advent  of  the 
scientific  method.  It  was  largely  out  of  this  frame 
of  mind  that  Christianity  arose.  The  reports  of  its 
miracles  were  accepted  without  question.    When 

294 


GREAT  QUESTIONS  IN  LITTLE 

man  began  to  doubt  and  to  ask  for  proof,  then  his 
emancipation  from  error  began. 

IV.    EARLY   MAN 

A  factor  that  has,  no  doubt,  played  an  important 
part  in  man's  evolution  is  the  much  greater  swing 
which  the  law  of  variation  has  in  his  case  than  in 
that  of  any  other  animal.  The  extent  of  variation 
in  the  mental  capacity  of  men  has  no  parallel  in 
any  other  species  in  the  animal  kingdom.  The 
individual  differences  between  animals  of  the  same 
species,  in  disposition,  in  intelligence,  is  consider- 
able, but  in  the  case  of  man  it  is  enormous.  With 
this  sweep  of  variation  man's  development  would 
be  rapid.  The  most  gifted  led  the  race  forward. 
Our  civilization  is  the  work  of  a  few  minds;  all 
progress  is  the  work  of  a  few  minds.  The  rank 
and  file  of  mankind  follow  their  natural  captains 
and  leaders.  The  law  of  variation  has  evidently 
worked  more  and  more  in  man  the  farther  he  de- 
parted from  the  lower  orders,  so  that  he  has  pro- 
gressed with  accelerated  rapidity.  Every  advance 
gained  made  a  greater  advance  possible.  The  \x)s- 
sibilities,  say  with  dogs,  are  very  limited;  the  possi- 
bilities wuth  man  are  almost  infinite. 

No  doubt  the  first  rude  man,  or  the  immediate 
animal  ancestor  of  man,  made  himself  a  nest  or  a 
shelter  from  the  storms  long  before  he  became  a 
tool-user.  The  orang  makes  a  platform  of  branches 

295 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

in  a  tree,  upon  which  he  sleeps,  but  he  has  no  tools 
or  weapons.  When  this  ancestor  used  his  first  tool, 
—  a  stone  to  crack  a  bone  or  a  nut,  or  a  stick  to 
reach  a  fruit  or  to  drive  off  a  foe,  —  that  was  the 
beginning  of  the  great  change,  the  great  progress, 
then  was  the  man  really  born.   It  is  as  a  tool-user 
and   weapon-user    that    man's    advance    over    all 
other  animals  begins.   The  more  he  used  them,  the 
more   his    intelligence  was  stimulated;    the   more 
his  hand  was  trained,  the  more  his  brain  was  de- 
veloped.    Each   reacted   upon   the   other.    Then, 
when  this  creature  began  to  shape  and  improve  his 
tool  —  that  was  the  second  great  step.   Wood  and 
bone,  at  first,  no  doubt,  were  the  substances  used 
or   improved   upon.    Then   came   the   shaping  of 
stone  implements  —  arrowheads,  spears,  and  axes. 
When  he  discovered  the  use  of  fire  and  how  to 
control  it  —  what  a  step  was  that !   In  those  two 
things  —  the  shaping  of  tools  and  the  use  of  fire  — 
lay  the  germ  of  all  his  subsequent  progress.     All 
this  time  he  must  have  been  a  savage  wild  beast, 
probably  covered  with  hair,  and  subsisting  upon 
roots  and  fruits  and  smaller  animals.    His  teeth 
were  for  rending  and  his  hands  for  seizing.   He  was 
probably  a  healthy  animal,  free  from  the  diseases 
of  the  housed  and  clothed  man.  The  nature  within 
him  fitted  the  nature  without  him.    Instinct  ruled 
him.    But  as  his  reason  began  to  develop,  and  to 
cross   Nature,   error,   or   sin   and   disease,   came. 

296 


GREAT  QUESTIONS  IN  LITTLE 

Hence  the  truth  at  the  bottom  of  the  old  myth, 
that  it  was  by  the  fall  of  man  came  all  our  diseases. 
The  birth  of  reason  was  the  fall  of  man,  and  only 
then  did  error  and  sin  become  possible;  only  when 
man  crosses  Nature  and  seeks  to  rule  her,  does 
disease,  as  we  know  it,  appear,  because  only  then 
does  error  appear.  The  animals  do  not  err;  they 
go  along  with  Nature;  it  is  a  survival  of  the  fittest; 
but  give  an  animal  a  tool  or  a  weapon,  and  the 
naturally  weak  may  survive  over  the  naturally 
strong.  If  we  could  only  know  all  the  steps  of  man's 
progress  from  his  nearest  animal  ancestor ! 

The  third  step  in  man's  progress  was  taken  when 
he  tamed  and  used  other  animals.  His  fourth  great 
step  was  when  he  began  to  cultivate  the  soil,  or  to 
plant  and  reap.  At  first  he  was,  of  course,  a  hunter 
and  fisherman.  He  must  have  evolved  some  sort 
of  language  soon  after  his  emergence  from  the 
lower  animal  state.  Writing,  of  course,  came  much 
later. 

The  greatest  step  of  all  will  be  when  man  learns 
to  stamp  out  disease  through  his  more  complete 
knowledge  of  Nature. 

V.     ASTRONOMIC   GRANDEUR 

We  humanize  the  nature  we  see  around  as  in  field 
and  river  and  wood;  we  infuse  ourselves  into  it;  we 
fill  the  lap  of  earth  with  treasures  not  her  own;  but 
when  we  look  up  to  the  heavens,  when  we  behold 

297 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

the  midnight  skies,  and  ponder  upon  the  truth  that 
science  reveals  to  us  there,  we  are  moved  in  a  differ- 
ent way.  And  when  we  peer  into  the  vista  of  the 
geologic  ages  our  humanizing  process  does  not  come 
into  play.  In  fact,  the  two  great  sciences,  astronomy 
and  geology,  move  us  without  any  admixture  of  the 
human  element;  they  move  us  by  their  grandeur, 
by  the  conception  of  time  and  space  which  they 
force  upon  us.  In  these  fields  science  opens  up  to  us 
views  into  the  universe  of  non-living  matter  that 
not  only  challenge  our  reasoning  faculties,  but  also 
stimulate  our  imagination,  views  that  overwhelm  us 
with  a  sense  of  power  and  magnitude.  We  do  not 
see  ourselves  reflected  there  —  we  are  swept  away 
from  ourselves,  and  impressed  with  our  own  insignif- 
icance. Astronomy  is  pure  science.  It  reveals  to  us 
mechanical  principles  working  on  such  a  scale  and 
with  such  harmony  and  precision  that  we  get  a  new 
conception  of  these  principles.  They  encompass  the 
universe;  they  guide  the  stars  in  their  courses,  they 
are  the  builders  and  upholders  of  suns  and  systems. 
The  cosmos  is  automatic,  blind  physical  forces  work 
there  with  mathematical  exactness,  but  all  is  on 
such  a  scale  and  involving  such  an  element  of  time 
and  distance  that  we  never  think  of  it  as  mechanical. 
We  do  not  see  the  wheels  go  round;  we  do  not  see  the 
source  or  the  distribution  of  the  power;  all  is  as  fluid 
and  spontaneous  as  a  meadow  brook.  We  do  not  see 
matter  or  motion  as  we  know  them  upon  the  earth; 

298 


GREAT  QUESTIONS  IN  LITTLE 

we  see  light  and  splendor  and  eternal  repose.  But 
the  astronomer  knows  that  the  light  and  splendor 
are  shed  by  inert  matter,  obeying  the  inexorable 
laws  of  celestial  physics.  If  the  stars  sang  in  their 
courses,  and  the  whole  universe  were  alive,  as  some 
European  scientists  have  audaciously  affirmed,  the 
facts  would  seem  more  in  accord  with  the  impression 
they  give  us  than  does  the  mechanistic  conception  of 
them.  But  the  bare  facts  of  astronomy  are  beyond 
our  power  of  humanization;  in  their  naked  grandeur 
they  strike  us  dumb.  \Miitman  gives  us  a  fresh  im- 
pression of  this  when  he  opens  his  scuttle  at  night 
and  sees  far-sprinkled  systems.  He  does  not  add  to 
or  take  from  the  facts,  but  by  his  art  he  quickens  our 
sense  of  limitless  space  and  the  wild  dance  and  wliirl 
of  the  heavenly  hosts. 

Celestial  mechanics  are  certainly  the  same  as 
terrestrial  mechanics,  and  if  we  fancy  that  matter 
up  there  is  any  more  spiritual  than  it  is  here  under- 
foot, we  are  giving  way  to  our  humanistic  tenden- 
cies. Starlight  does  not  differ  in  its  nature  from 
lamplight,  and  the  ffight  to  us  across  the  gulf  of 
space  has  not  changed  its  character.  If  the  stars 
sing  in  their  courses,  then  the  earth  sings  in  its 
course;  if  the  celestial  bodies  thrill  with  life,  the 
earth,  too,  thrills  with  life. 

The  universe  is  one,  and  not  two  or  three.  It  is 
not  symbolized  by  a  straight  line,  but  by  the  curve, 
which  goes  not  in  one  direction,  but  in  all  directions, 

299 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

or,  rather,  is  without  direction.  It  is  that  enigmati- 
cal contradictory  thing.  We  cannot  think  of  the 
universe  as  a  whole,  because  a  whole  has  bounds, 
and  we  cannot  think  of  it  as  a  part,  because  we  ask 
where  are  the  other  parts? 

VI.    WHY  AND   HOW 

We  are  told  that  the  function  of  science  is  not  to 
ask  why,  but  how.  This  is  largely  true.  Philosophy 
asks  why.  Science  does  not  ask  why  we  are  here, 
but  how  we  are  here  and  how  we  stay  here  —  how 
our  food  nourishes  us,  how  our  physical  functions 
are  carried  on,  how  one  form  of  life  gives  rise  to  an- 
other form,  and  the  like.  Science  aims  to  give  the 
reason  of  things,  to  trace  secondary  causes.  It  is 
dumb  before  the  question  of  first  causes.  We  often 
ask  the  question  "Why"  when  we  are  really  seeking 
the  "How."  Why  does  a  plant  lean  toward  the 
light,  why  do  the  seasons  change,  why  do  rain  and 
snow  fall,  why  is  the  sky  blue,  why  is  snow  white, 
why  does  the  tide  ebb  and  flow,  when  we  are  really 
in  quest  of  the  reason  of  these  things  —  the  how  of 
them. 

We  do  not  know  why  the  sky  is  blue,  or  the  grass 
green,  that  is,  for  what  purpose;  or  for  what  pur- 
pose the  tides  ebb  and  flow,  or  why  a  man  stops 
growing  at  a  certain  age,  or  why  water  expands 
when  it  freezes.  But  we  think  we  know  why  flowers 
are  sweet-scented,  or  brightly  colored,  why  some  of 

300 


GREAT   QUESTIONS   IN   LITTLE 

them  have  contrivances  to  secure  cross-fertilization, 
why  some  seeds  have  hooks,  others  wings,  and 
others  springs.  But  all  these  "whys"  are  involved 
in  the  "hows"  of  the  plants'  getting  on  in  the  world. 
Why  the  child  is  afraid  in  the  dark,  and  why  the 
infant  has  such  a  strong  grip  in  its  hands,  have  good 
and  suflScient  reasons  in  the  past  history  of  the  race. 
If  we  were  to  ask  why  the  moon  has  no  atmosphere, 
what  we  really  want  to  know  is.  How  hai)i)ens  it 
that  the  moon  has  no  atmosphere,  how  was  such  a 
condition  brought  about? 

VII.    LIMITATIONS    OF   SCIENCE 

On  as  sure  ground  as  we  know  that  food  nourishes 
us,  and  fire  warms  us,  do  we  not  know  that  the  soul 
is  identified  with  the  body,  an  organic  part  of  it, 
growing  with  its  growth,  decaying  with  its  decay, 
and  dying  with  its  death .^  Our  philosophy  or  our  the- 
ology may  lead  us  to  a  different  conclusion,  but  cer- 
tainly our  science  cannot.  The  touchstone  of  science 
is  proof  or  verification,  but  philosophy  lives  and 
moves  and  has  its  being  in  the  region  of  the  unveri- 
fiable  —  in  the  inner  world  of  man's  mental  life  — 
a  world  certainly  as  real  as  the  outer  world  of  his 
physical  life,  but  of  another  order,  and  amenable 
to  other  laws. 

We  may  say  that  the  soul  lived  before  the  body 
lived,  and  will  live  after  the  latter  is  dead,  but  we 
cannot  aflSrm  it  on  scientific  grounds,  that  is,  on 

301 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

grounds  of  physical  certainty  afforded  by  observa- 
tion and  experience.  There  are  only  two  kinds  of 
proof,  mathematical  proof,  and  experimental  or  sci- 
entific proof.  There  is  not,  and  cannot  be,  such  a 
thing  as  metaphysical  proof,  because  metaphysical 
truths  are  unconditioned  —  they  are  like  a  sea  with- 
out shores  or  land  without  boundaries.  We  may 
feel  them  to  be  real  and  true,  while  another  man 
may  not  feel  them  so  at  all.  But  the  truths  of  sci- 
ence and  mathematics  are  true  to  all  men.  To  dis- 
pute them  is  to  dispute  weights  and  measures.  A 
path  through  the  fields  seems  a  very  real  thing:  see 
it  winding  on  ahead  of  us;  our  feet  can  find  it  in  the 
dark,  but  it  is  only  a  phantom,  a  negation,  an  ab- 
sence of  something  —  a  result  of  the  attrition  of 
many  feet  passing  and  repassing  that  way.  Where 
are  the  tracks  we  made  in  last  year's  snow.'^  The 
snow  was  real,  and  still,  in  some  form,  exists;  and 
the  feet  were  real,  and  may  still  exist;  but  the  track 
was  only  a  shape  in  a  material  thing. 

In  the  printed  page  the  only  real  things  are  the 
paper  and  the  ink;  the  white  spaces  play  the  same 
part  in  aiding  the  eye  to  take  in  the  meaning  of  the 
print  as  do  the  black  letters.  The  type  was  real,  and 
the  mind  and  hands  that  shaped  the  type,  and  the 
compositor  that  set  it  up,  were  real,  and  the  sense 
of  the  print  is  real  to  the  mind,  but  not  to  the 
body.  All  this  science  affirms;  what  does  philosophy 
affirm? 

302 


GREAT   QUESTIONS   IN  LITTLE 

VIII.    BEGINNINGS 

The  problem  of  the  beginning  of  anything  when 
philosophically  considered  is  an  elusive  problem. 
Everything  and  every  condition  has  its  antecedents, 
and  these  antecedents  have  their  antecedents.  In 
spring  the  sap  begins  to  mount  in  the  trees,  but  to 
draw  a  line  between  its  state  of  quiescence  and  its 
state  of  activity  could  only  be  done  in  imagination. 
It  is  not  like  a  gun  that  is  ready  to  go  off  when  the 
trigger  is  pulled.  It  goes  off  slowly  and  insensibly. 
It  is  "fixing  to  begin  to  get  ready"  to  go  off  all  win- 
ter, as  the  old  colored  w^oman  said  about  a  like 
matter.  The  grain  begins  to  sprout  in  the  ground, 
but  the  insensible  changes  in  the  germ  that  have 
preceded  the  actual  sprouting  —  what  about  them? 

Things  in  nature  begin,  but  they  begin  away 
back,  and  so  gradually  and  insensibly  that  we  can- 
not put  our  finger  on  the  point  of  actual  beginning; 
we  have  to  imagine  such  a  point.  Spencer  rej)udi- 
ates  the  theory  of  spontaneous  generation,  or  the 
instantaneous  birth  of  living  matter  from  the  non- 
living, because  such  a  theory  admits  of  no  steps  or 
gradations  in  the  process.  The  theory  of  generation 
by  evolution  is  more  thinkal^le  —  an  immeasurably 
slow  transformation  of  the  non-livnng  into  the  living 
without  any  fixed  line  between  them. 

If  we  cannot  say  that  life  ever  literally  begins,  can 
we  say  that  it  ever  literally  ends?    It  is  certainly 

303 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

true  that  the  inorganic  is  Ufted  into  the  organic,  and 
it  is  as  certainly  true  that  the  organic  falls  back 
again  into  the  inorganic,  and  the  movement  we  call 
life  ceases.  Spencer's  position  is  a  sort  of  philosophi- 
cal puzzle.  It  is  equivalent  to  saying  that  life  like 
matter  is  infinitely  divisible  or  reducible,  so  that  the 
mind  can  never  reach  the  point  where  life  ends  and 
the  non-life  begins.  If  in  the  case  of  matter  we  draw 
the  line  at  the  atom,  it  is  an  arbitrary  line,  so  in  the 
case  of  life,  any  line  we  may  draw  is  an  arbitrary 
line;  life  as  a  constant  becoming  and  a  constant  end- 
ing is  like  a  circle,  returning  forever  into  itself;  it 
begins  and  ends  at  every  imaginary  point.  The  old 
puzzle  that  motion  is  impossible  because  a  body  can- 
not move  where  it  is,  nor  where  it  is  not,  is  easily 
disposed  of  by  taking  one  step.  We  are  forced  to  the 
conclusion  that  life  on  the  globe  did  begin,  and  that 
it  will  in  time  as  surely  end. 

Kindling  a  fire  by  friction  might  symbolize 
Spencer's  idea  of  the  evolution  of  life.  When  does 
the  fire  begin?  Every  moment  in  the  process  has  its 
antecedent  moment  back  to  the  original  elements 
and  forces  that  built  up  the  wood  in  the  tree,  and 
the  first  molecule  of  smoke  that  appears  can  be 
infinitely  divided,  yet  combustion  finally  takes 
place. 

As  we  go  down  the  scale  of  animal  life  toward  the 
vegetable,  there  must  be  a  point  where  conscious- 
ness —  the  feeling  of  pleasure  and  pain  —  begins. 

304 


GREAT   QUESTIONS   IN   LITTLE 

No  matter  how  minute  the  gradations,  unless  we 
allow  our  minds  to  be  fooled  with  the  uld  j)liilu.s()phi- 
cal  puzzle  of  the  infinite  divisibility  of  space,  we 
come  to  a  point  in  thought  where  consciousness 
dawned.  (To  be  and  not  be  in  the  same  moment  of 
time,  that  is  the  puzzle.)  In  hke  manner,  as  we  go 
down  the  scale  of  the  organic  toward  the  inorganic, 
we  must  come  to  a  point  where  one  ceased  and  the 
other  began.  By  the  process  of  reasoning  that 
proves  that  Achilles  could  never  overtake  the  tor- 
toise, we  may  prove  that  evolution  of  life  never 
began,  the  organic  could  never  overtake  the  inor- 
ganic. But  the  fact  that  once  it  was  not  here  and  is 
here  now,  shows  the  fallacy  of  such  reasoning. 

The  evolution  of  one  animal  form  from  a  previ- 
ously existing  form  has  been  an  equally  gradual 
process.  The  horse  did  not  begin  as  the  horse;  he 
has  been  becoming  horse  through  countless  ages. 
So  with  all  other  forms.  The  descendants  of  a 
species  which  we  find  in  one  geologic  horizon  turn 
out  to  be  something  vastly  different  in  a  later  geo- 
logic horizon.  The  passage  from  one  species  to  an- 
other actually  took  place,  yet  where  can  you  draw 
the  line  between  them  —  between  the  non-man  iuid 
the  man? 

The  clock  begins  to  strike,  the  clock  itself  a^  a 
piece  of  machinery  had  a  beginning,  the  man  who 
made  the  clock  had  a  beginning  in  his  mother's 
womb,  but  the  beginning  of  the  germ  cell  from 

305 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

whence  he  sprang  —  where  was  that?  If  we  could 
trace  it  back  to  the  unicellular  life  of  Cambrian 
times,  could  we  find  its  beginning  then? 

All  these  questions  about  the  beginning  of  things 
return  forever  into  themselves;  and  their  final 
solution  baffles  us. 

rX.   EVOLUTION 

We  are  apt  to  think  the  book  of  evolution  closed, 
the  tale  finished.  But  can  it  be  true?  The  evolution 
or  transformation  of  the  earth's  surface  certainly  is 
not  finished,  and  never  can  be  finished.  As  long  as 
the  rains  continue  to  fall,  and  the  seasons  to  change, 
and  vegetation  to  grow,  the  land  surface  of  the 
globe  must  continue  to  alter.  As  long  as  the  secu- 
lar cooling  of  the  earth  goes  on,  the  crust  must 
continue  to  fold  and  in  places  to  be  lifted  up.  Geol- 
ogy shows  us  that  millions  of  years  ago  it  was  vastly 
different  from  what  we  now  behold  it.  How  will  it 
be  as  many  millions  of  years  hence?  How  different, 
too,  was  the  animal  life  of  the  globe  during  the  past 
geologic  periods  from  the  animal  life  of  to-day !  Will 
it  not  differ  as  much  from  that  of  to-day  millions  of 
years  hence?  The  changes  and  transformations  will 
doubtless  be  slower  in  the  future  than  in  the  past, 
because  the  globe  is  older,  life  is  older,  the  physical 
forces  are  less  riotous,  life  is  less  gross  and  turbulent; 
still,  radical  changes  must  slowly  appear.  I  cannot 
beheve  that  the  race  of  man  has  run  its  evolutionary 

306 


GEEAT  QUESTIONS   IN  LITTLE 

course.  One  cannot  see  where  there  is  any  room  for 
a  physical  change,  but  the  mental  grovvtli  may  \>g 
enormous,  incalculable.  All  our  theories  of  knowl- 
edge, all  our  beliefs,  are  founded  upon  the  assui illa- 
tion that  we  have  reached  the  summit  of  human  life. 
But  just  as  the  men  of  a  few  centuries  ago  were 
children  in  the  arts  and  sciences,  compared  with  us, 
so  we  shall  doubtless  appear  as  children  when  com- 
pared with  men  a  few  centuries  hence.  The  mental 
powers  of  man  may  not  have  increased  since  Aris- 
totle and  Plato,  but  that  is  only  a  brief  time.  Local, 
and,  as  it  were,  accidental,  causes  may  accoimt  f(3r 
that.  Wait  five  or  ten  thousand  years,  and  then  see. 
It  is  a  long  road  and  it  is  up  and  down  hill.  Man  is 
now  armed  with  the  w^eapons  of  science  as  he  never 
has  been  before,  and  his  conquest  over  Nature  is 
bound  to  be  more  and  more  complete. 

Whole  tribes  and  families  of  animals  have  become 
extinct  in  the  past,  and  others  will  probably  lxN?ome 
extinct  in  the  future,  but  one  can  think  of  the  race 
of  man  as  becoming  extinct  only  on  some  radical 
cosmic  change  in  the  earth,  such  as  there  has  been  in 
some  of  the  other  planets  and  in  oiu*  moon.  This 
change  will  come,  but  not  in  millions  of  years. 

Unless  the  waste  of  the  fertility  of  the  land  into 
the  sea  through  man's  agency  is  checked,  the  fertil- 
ity of  the  soil  in  the  course  of  countless  ages  will  no 
longer  support  the  race,  but  this  as  a  cause  working 
against  the  perpetuity  of  the  race  can  be  and  doubl- 

307 


UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREES 

less  will  be  checked.  The  fuel  in  the  earth  will  be 
exhausted  in  a  thousand  or  more  years,  and  its  min- 
eral wealth,  but  man  will  find  substitutes  for  these 
in  the  winds,  the  waves,  the  sun's  heat,  and  so  forth. 

X.    AN   UNKNOWN   FACTOR 

How  this  unknown  factor  in  life,  or  the  vague 
consciousness  of  it,  hovers  in  the  background  of 
the  minds  of  even  the  most  rigid  scientists !  It  hov- 
ered in  Darwin's  mind  when  he  said  he  could  not 
look  upon  man,  with  all  his  wonderful  powers,  as  the 
result  of  mere  chance,  though  his  theories  of  the 
origin  of  species  made  man  the  result  of  fortuitous 
variations  conserved  and  improved  upon  by  natural 
selection.  It  hovered  in  Tyndall's  mind  when  his 
physicochemical  theory  of  the  origin  of  life  left  him 
on  the  brink  of  an  abyss,  and  he  contemplated 
"the  mystery  and  miracle  of  vitality."  It  hovered 
in  Huxley's  mind  when  he  resented  the  charge  of 
materialism  and  gave  consciousness  a  place  with 
matter  and  energy  as  one  of  the  three  reahties  in 
the  universe.  It  hovered  in  Haeckel's  mind  when  he 
admitted  a  psychic  principle  in  the  atom.  Professor 
Osborn  finds  some  unknown  and  unknowable  factor 
in  evolution  from  the  fact  that  some  parts  or  organs 
are  adaptive,  or  purposeful,  from  the  first,  and  were 
fitted  to  survive  when  they  first  appeared. 

THE  END 


INDEX 


INDEX 


Agassiz,  Loui3,  163. 

Animals,  fear  in,  11-17;  most 
up  to  standard,  91,  92;  strug- 
gle for  life,  95,  96. 

Antennaria.    See  Everlasting. 

Apples,  humorous  conduct  of 
apples  in  a  water-barrel,  199, 
200. 

Apples,  May,  122. 

Aristotle,  on  the  internal  spon- 
taneity of  living  things,  248. 

Arnold,  Matthew,  on  Emerson, 
197. 

Astronomy,  grandeur  of,  297- 
300. 

Atom,  the,  167-171. 

Bailey,  Liberty  Hyde,  on  sur- 
vival of  the  weak,  280,  281. 

Balfour,  Arthur  James,  Berg- 
son's  book,  201,  203. 

Bears,  86. 

Bee.    See  Honey-bee. 

Beetle,  dung,  79. 

Bergson,  Henri,  his  literary 
treatment  of  scientific  sub- 
jects, 185;  the  friend  and  aid- 
er of  those  who  would  see 
with  the  spirit,  197;  person- 
ality, 198;  importance  of  his 
work,  198;  his  essay  on 
laughter,  199,  200;  his  su- 
perb style,  201;  reception  of 
his  philosophy.  201,  202;  ap- 
peal of  his  book,  202,  203; 
opens  a  new  world,  204,  205; 
his  genius,  204;  a  great  lit- 
erary artist,  205,  200;  his  ^ 
position,  206-211;  intuition; 
his    method,    211,    212;    his  j 


view    of    lift',    213-222;    hip 
philosophy,  223-227. 

Biotic  energy,  IbO. 

Birds,  of  the  orchards,  1-7; 
plumage,  song,  and  scxurI- 
ity,  67,  68;  reproductive  in- 
stinct, 69-71;  feigning  lame- 
ness, 75,  76;  flight-songs.  76; 
of  a  Georgia  winter  and  early 
spring,  90-104;  trimness,  91, 
92;  struggle  for  life,  95.  96; 
length  of  life,  90;  nervous- 
ne^-s  of  flocks,  90-100;  quar- 
relsomeness, 100-102;  in 
southern  California.  119.  120. 

Blackbird,  Brewer's,  plumage, 
119;  habits,  120;  notes,  120. 

Black-cap,  Wilson's,  115. 

Blasting,  57,  58. 

Bluebird,  a  young.  117. 

Body,  intelligence  of,  140,  141. 

Boulders,  53-58. 

Browning.  Robert,  quoted,  77. 

Bruno,  Giordano,  165. 

Bunting,  snow,  S3. 

Burdock,  69. 

California,  quartz  pebbles  in. 
52;  dance  of  seasons.  117, 
118;  an  automobile  ride  in. 
119;  birds.  119.  120. 

Carlyle,  Thonia.'^.  quoted,  134. 
183;  repelled  by  material- 
ism. \h2,  1S3. 

Carrel.  Dr.  AU-xi.'^.  173. 

Caterpillars,  counterfeit  eyea, 
124. 

Catskills,  geology.  43-51. 

Cause.  First.  165.  166. 

Cell,  the,  intelhgcnce  of,  138. 

311 


INDEX 


Chance,  plays  an  important 
part  in  life,  228;  and  law, 
228-233;  and  life,  233-261. 

Changes,  slow  and  rapid,  105- 
111. 

Chemistry,  on  the  road  to  life, 
239. 

Chestnut,  flowers,  78. 

Chewink,  in  Georgia,  91,  96, 
97;  scratching,  97. 

Chickadee,  83. 

Chickweed,  88. 

Chipmunk,  an  outdoor  pet,  7- 
36;  food  and  feeding-habits, 
7-9,  18-26,  36;  well-groomed, 
10;  nervous  manner,  10;  fear, 
11-15;  ahawk-and-chipmunk 
incident,  12;  den,  20-39; 
relations  of  the  sexes,  23,  24 ; 
a  hermit,  33. 

Choice,  freedom  of,  155. 

Claremont,  Cal.,  119. 

Coleridge,  Samuel  Taylor,  177. 

Coney,  or  least  hare,  ot  pika,  33. 

Corn,  Indian,  reproduction,  77, 
78. 

Counterfeits  in  nature,  121-124. 

Crow,  16,  86;  caution  and  cun- 
ning, 99;  social  instinct,  101. 

Dana,  James  Dwight,  50. 

Darwin,  Charles,  52,  138;  his 
scientific  faith,  163-165;  his 
sexual  selection,  190;  as  a 
creative  evolutionist,  217- 
219;  considered  natural  selec- 
tion a  process,  not  a  cause, 
267;  great  importance  of  his 
work,  270;  his  natural  selec- 
tion theory,  271-280,  291- 
293 ;  and  the  unknown  factor 
in  life,  308. 

Dover,  England,  51. 

Duck,  black,  and  hawks,  84. 

Earth,  the,  paradoxes  of  its 
sphericity,  148-150,  161. 


Electricity,  atomic  theory  of, 
170. 

Elliott,  H.  S.  R.,  201. 

Emerson,  Ralph  Waldo,  quot- 
ed, 125,  142,  197,  241,  275; 
Arnold  on,  197;  his  intuition, 
223. 

Ether,  the,  159;  a  necessary  hy- 
pothesis, 289-291. 

Everlasting  (Antennaria) ,  77. 

Evolution,  onward  impulse  in, 
138,  139;  Bergson's  view 
of,  206-227;  Darwin's  view, 
217-219;  hypothesis  of  a  cre- 
ative impulse  necessary,  262- 
288;  unending,  306-308.  See 
also  Life  and  Natural  Selec- 
tion. 

Experiment,  speculation  and, 
293,  294. 

Eye,  evolution  of,  292,  293. 

Fabre,  Jean  Henri,  79,  80. 

Faith,  scientific,  and  theologi- 
cal, 159-162;  of  Wallace, 
163;  of  Agassiz,  163;  of  Dar- 
win, 163-165;  of  Tyndall, 
165;  of  Huxley,  166-171;  of 
Lodge,  171;  of  Loeb,  171;  of 
Haeckel,  172-175;  increases 
as  theological  faith  wanes, 
175. 

Falkland  Islands,  52. 

Fate,  and  free  will,  142-158. 

Firestone,  56. 

Flicker,  food,  86. 

Frog,  wood,  hibernating,  38. 

Georgia,  birds  seen  in,  90-104. 
Glaciers,  slowness  and  power, 

109. 
Goethe,  111,  134,  182. 
Gravity,  overcome  by  gravity, 

147. 
Grouse,  ruffed,  or  partridge,  a 

miscellaneous   feeder,    85;   a 

covey  of  young,  116. 


312 


INDEX 


Haeckel,  Ernst,  his  scientific 
faith,  172-175;  admitted  a 
psychic  principle  in  the  atom, 
308. 

Hare,  least,  or  coney,  or  pika, 
33. 

Hawk,  Cooper's,  84. 

Hawk,  duck,  84. 

Hawk,  hen,  116. 

Hawk,  sharp-shinned,  98. 

Hawk,  sparrow,  young,  101, 
102. 

Hen-hawk,  116. 

Honey-bee,  reproduction,  73, 
74. 

Horse,  evolution,  278-280. 

"How,"  and  "Why,"  300,  301. 

Hugo,  Victor,  quoted,  291. 

Huxley,  Thomas  Henry,  his 
scientific  faith,  166,  167;  his 
conception  of  electricity,  170; 
his  agnosticism,  171;  his 
literary  style,  186,  187; 
quoted,  186,  187;  a  fatalist, 
230;  his  three  realities,  308. 

Indian  loaf,  123. 
Indigo-bird,  a  family,  6. 
Insects,  breeding-habits,  79,  80. 
Interpretation,  176,  177. 
Intuition,  transcendental  truth 
comes  by,  223. 

James,   William,  on  Bergson's 

book,  201,  205. 
Jay,  blue,  and  screech  owl,  1. 
Junco,  93;  migration,  99. 

Killdeer,  104. 

Kinglet,  ruby-crowned,  song, 
113. 

Lankester,  Sir  Edwin  Ray,  dis- 
agrees with  Bergson,  201. 
Law,  and  chance,  228-233. 
Lemming,  68. 
Life,  preponderance  of  the  life- 


less over,  125-131;  plan  of, 
131;  intolligonro  inseparable 
from,  132;  reality  of,  136- 
137;  had  no  beginning,  213; 
play  and  interplay  between 
spirit  and  matter,  213-217; 
matter  its  seat,  not  ita 
source,  217;  and  chance.  233- 
201;  mechani.stic  conception 
of,  233,  234;  hampered  and 
bound  by  matter,  244;  aa  a 
traveler,  263-28S;  its  begin- 
nings, 303-306.  iS'ee  also  Evo- 
lution. 

Light,  nature  of,  289,  290. 

Lightning,  favors  certain  trees, 
235. 

Lion,  16,  17. 

Literature,  interpretation  of 
life,  176,  177;  compared  and 
contrasted  with  science,  176- 
181;  antipathy  between  sci- 
ence and,  183,  184.  194;  love 
and  contemplation  necessary 
to,  183,  184;  its  use  of  scien- 
tific matter,  184-189;  influ- 
ence of  science  on,  193,  194, 
196. 

Lodge,  Sir  Oliver,  his  extra- 
scientific  step.  171,  189,  2.30; 
in  accord  with  Bergson,  201. 
203. 

Loeb,  Jacques,  171. 

Lookout  Mountain,  49. 

Mallard,  and  hawks,  84. 

Man,  littleness  of,  129;  a  part 
of  nature,  132-134;  tran- 
scends his  body,  141;  extent 
of  variation  in.  295;  steps  in 
his  progress  from  the  animal, 
295-297;  his  fall.  297:  future 
development.  .307,  308. 

May,  a  morning  of,  112-116. 

May-fly,  79. 

Mendeli.in  law.  253. 

Milkweed,  conmjon,  87. 


313 


INDEX 


Mimicry,  124. 

Mind,     the    primal,     125-141; 

reality  of,  135,  136. 
Miracles,  162. 
Mockingbird,  Western,  habits, 

120;  song,  120,  121. 
Mockingbirds,      Eastern     and 

Antillean,  song,  120.  121. 
Monera,  172,  173,  175. 
Mt.  San  Antonio,  118,  119. 
Mouse,  nest  of,  44,  45. 
Mouse-ear.   See  Everlasting. 

Natural  selection,  inadequacy, 
131,  138,  218,  262-288,  291- 
293;  Weismann's  concep- 
tion of,  262-264;  fundamen- 
tally unlike  artificial  selec- 
tion, 271-274. 

Nehrling,  Henry,  114, 

Oak-apples,  122. 

Orchard,  natural  history  in,  1- 

7. 
Oriole,  Baltimore,  6. 
Osborn,    Henry    Fairfield,    on 

adaptation,  286,  308. 

Partridge.   See  Grouse,  ruffed. 

Perfumes,  of  May,  112. 

Petrified  forests,  110. 

Phoebe,  fly-catching,  7;  per- 
sistent nest-builders,  70,  71; 
nesting-sites,  117. 

Pigeon,  passenger,  97. 

Pika,  or  coney,  33. 

Plants,  mating,  77,  78;  wisdom 
in,  87-89. 

Plasmogen,  180. 

Plover,  golden,  71. 

Plover,  killdee  or  killdeer,  104. 

Plutarch,  questions  discussed 
by,  294. 

Polygala,  fringed,  122,  123. 

Pope,  Alexander,  quoted,  134. 

Porcupine,  16. 

Poulton,  Edward  Bagnall,  dis- 


putes Bergson's  doctrine  of 
instinct,  201. 
Proof,  the  two  kinds  of,  302. 

Quack-grass,  88. 
Quail,  nest,  103. 
Quartz,     pebbles,    52;    moun- 
tains, 52. 

Rabbit,  fear,  16;  arts  of  con- 
cealment, 102,  103;  forms, 
102,  103. 

Raccoon,  a  starving,  95. 

Redstart,  showing  off  plumage, 
5,  6. 

Red-thorn,  and  cattle,  258- 
260. 

Reproductive  instinct,  the  mas- 
ter instinct,  65-81 ;  a  kind  of 
madness,  66-68;  and  the  his- 
tory of  man,  72;  and  dancing, 
72;  and  death,  73,  74. 

Robin,  5,  83;  starving  to  death 
in  March,  94,  95. 

Rocks,  attraction  of,  40-46; 
the  final  source  of  all,  40; 
motion  of,  42,  43;  arrange- 
ment in  the  Catskills,  46—51; 
conglomerate,  48-53 ;  two 
classes,  boulders  and  place 
rocks,  53-58;  stratified  rocks, 
59-64. 

Rousseau,  John  James,  quoted, 
229. 

Royce,  Josiah,  his  "Spirit  of 
Modern  Philosophy"  quoted, 
211. 

Sapsucker,  yellow-bellied,  sap- 
sucking  habits,  2-4. 

Science,  interpretation  of  life, 
176,  177;  compared  and  con- 
trasted with  literature,  176- 
181 ;  the  antithesis  of  poetry, 
177;  antipathetic  to  literature, 
183,  184,  194;  literary  treat- 
ment of,  184-189;  dehuman- 


314 


INDEX 


izes  nature,  190,  191;  its  in- 
fluence on  modern  literature, 
193,  194;  its  influence  on  re- 
ligion and  politics,  194;  tends 
to  unify  the  nations,  194;  and 
man's  life,  194-196;  inade- 
quacy, 196;  limitations,  301, 
302;  proof  its  touchstone, 
301,  302. 

Selection,  natural  and  artificial. 
See  Natural  selection. 

Shawangunk  Mountains,  geol- 
ogy, 60,  109. 

Skunk,  16. 

Slate,  45. 

Soddy,  Frederick,  quoted,  249, 
250. 

Sound,  nature  of,  289. 

Sparrow,  song,  in  Georgia,  90- 
92,  96,  97,  100,  101;  scratch- 
ing, 97;  migration,  98,  99. 

Sparrow,  white-crowned,  song, 
120. 

Sparrow,  white-throated,  in 
Georgia,  90-93,  96,  97,  100, 
101;  migration,  99. 

Speculation,  and  experiment, 
293,  294. 

Spencer,  Herbert,  his  mechan- 
istic philosophy  and  juice- 
less  style,  188,  189;  his  idea  of 
the  evolution  of  life,  303,  304. 

Spiders,  female  eating  male, 
79,  80. 

Squirrel,  gray,  10,  86. 

Squirrel,  red,  4;  more  energetic 
and  a  more  miscellaneous 
feeder  than  the  gray,  86. 

Squirrels,  tails,  10. 

Struggle  for  life,  95,  96,  285, 
286. 

Supernatural,  the,  in  literature, 
193. 

Tanager,  scarlet,  6. 
Tennyson,  Alfred,  quoted,  115. 
Thistle,  Canada,  87. 


Thorn,  red,  and  cattle.  258-260. 

Thrush,  hermit,  5;  feeding  in  a 
dooryard,  93.  94. 

Trees,  fall  of,  105.  100. 

Tuckahoe,  123. 

Tyndall,  John,  his  scientific 
faith,  165;  on  the  analytic 
and  the  synthetic  types  of 
mind,  182;  hi.s  literary  gift*, 
182.  185,  187;  quoted.  \Hb, 
188,  308;  on  the  origin  of  life, 
219-222.  308. 

Universe,  the  mind  in,  125-130; 
godlessness,  130. 

Veronica,  field,  88. 

Vitality,  degrees  of,  282-284. 

Wallace,  Alfred  Russel,  his  sci- 
entific faith,  163,  164;  his 
anthropomorphism,  190. 

War,  the  European,  107,  108, 
158,  228. 

Warbler,  black-poll,  coloring 
and  song,  115. 

Warbler,  black-throated  green, 
on  the  ground.  1 14. 

Warbler,  blue-winged  yellow  or 
blue-winged,  112. 

Warbler,  chestnut-sided,  on  the 
ground.  114.  115. 

Warbler,  golden-winged,  song. 
113.  114. 

Warbler.  Wilson's,  or  Wilson's 
black-cap.  115. 

Warbler,  yellow  redpoll  or  yel- 
low palm.  113. 

Waterfalls,  in  ratskilL«<.  45.  46. 

Weasel.  87;  boldness.  16;  and 
chipmunk.  17.  18;  blood- 
thirstiness.  17. 

Weismann.  August.  80,  124; 
his  conception  of  the  posi- 
tive character  of  natural  ho- 
lortion.  262-204.  206.  207. 

Whitman.   Walt.   299;  quoted. 


315 


INDEX 


5,  79,  181,  182,  193,  195,  223, 
229,  291;  his  anthropomor- 
phism, 193,  194;  his  intui- 
tion, 223. 

"Why,"  and  "How,"  300,  301. 

Will,  free,  and  fate,  142-158. 

Wisdom,  natural,  82-89. 

Woodchuck,  4;  change  of  habi- 
tat and  probable  change  of 
color,  39. 


Woodcock,  feigning  lameness, 
75,  76;  song-flight,  76. 

Woodpecker,  downy,  101. 

Woodpecker,  yellow-bellied.  See 
Sapsucker, 

Wordsworth,  William,  quoted, 
181. 

Wren,  marsh,  cock  nests,  123. 

Yosemite,  110. 


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